Adirondack Corn-Bread.
5 great spoonfuls Indian meal.
3 great spoonfuls wheat flour.
5 eggs, well-beaten—whites and yolks separately.
1 table-spoonful white sugar.
1 small teacupful melted butter.
1 teaspoonful soda, dissolved in hot water.
2 teaspoonfuls cream tartar, sifted into the flour.
1 pint milk, or enough to make batter about the consistency of pound-cake.
Melt, but do not heat the butter; add to the milk and beaten yolks; next, the soda; then, the meal, alternately with the whites; then, the sugar, lastly the flour, through which the cream tartar has been sifted, stirring it lightly and swiftly. Bake in a broad, shallow pan, in a tolerably brisk oven,—or, if you prefer, in muffin-rings.
Loaf Corn-Bread. (Excellent.)
2 heaping cups white Indian meal.
1 heaping cup flour.
3 eggs—whites and yolks beaten separately.
2½ cups of milk.
1 large table-spoonful of butter—melted, but not hot.
1 large table-spoonful white sugar.
1 teaspoonful soda, dissolved in hot water.
2 teaspoonfuls cream-tartar, sifted with the flour, and added the last thing.
1 teaspoonful of salt.
Bake steadily, but not too fast, in a well-greased mould. Turn out, when done, upon a plate, and eat at once, cutting it into slices as you would cake.
After twelve years’ trial of this receipt, I have come to the conclusion that there is no better or more reliable rule for the manufacture of corn-bread. In all that time, there has hardly been a Sunday morning, winter or summer, when the family was at home, on which a loaf of this bread has not graced my breakfast-table, and unless when, through negligence, it has been slightly scorched or underdone, I have never known it to come short of excellence.
In cutting corn-bread, do not forget to hold the knife perpendicularly, that the spongy interior of the loaf may not be crushed into heaviness. Very good corn-bread is often ruined by neglect of this precaution.
Corn-Meal Muffins. (Raised.)
3 cups white Indian meal.
3 table-spoonfuls yeast.
1 cup flour.
1 quart scalding milk.
3 eggs, beaten to a froth, yolks and whites apart.
1 table-spoonful white sugar.
1 table-spoonful lard.
1 table-spoonful butter.
1 teaspoonful salt.
Pour the milk boiling hot upon the meal; stir well and leave until nearly cold. Then beat in gradually the yeast, sugar and flour, and set in a moderately warm place. It should be light enough in five or six hours. Melt, without overheating, the butter and lard; stir into the batter, with the salt, lastly the beaten eggs. Beat all together three minutes; put in greased muffin-rings; let these rise on the hearth for a quarter of an hour, with a cloth thrown lightly over them. Bake about twenty minutes in a quick, steady oven, or until they are of a light golden-brown.
Send at once to table, and in eating them, break, not cut them open.
Corn-Meal Muffins. (Quick.)
2 cups Indian meal.
1 cup flour.
3 eggs, beaten very light.
3 cups milk.
2 table-spoonfuls melted butter.
1 table-spoonful white sugar.
1 teaspoonful soda, dissolved in hot water.
2 teaspoonfuls cream tartar, sifted with flour.
Mix quickly, beating all the ingredients well together; pour into greased muffin-rings, or, better still, into the small round or oval iron pans, now sold for baking corn-bread. Bake in a brisk oven, and send directly to table. All kinds of corn-bread are spoiled if allowed to cool before they are eaten.