A CHARLOTTE À LA PARISIENNE.
This dish is sometimes called in England a Vienna cake; and it is known here also, we believe, as a Gâteaux de Bordeaux. Cut horizontally into half-inch slices a Savoy or sponge cake, and cover each slice with a different kind of preserve; replace them in their original form, and spread equally over the cake an icing made with the whites of three eggs, and four ounces of the finest pounded sugar; sift more sugar over it in every part, and put it into a very gentle oven to dry. The eggs should be whisked to snow before they are used. One kind of preserve, instead of several, can be used for this dish; and a rice or a pound cake may supply the place of the Savoy or sponge biscuit.
A GERTRUDE À LA CREME.
Slice a plain pound or rice cake as for the Charlotte à la Parisienne, and take a round out of the centre of each slice with a tin-cutter before the preserve is laid on; replace the whole in its original form, ice the outside with a green or rose coloured icing at pleasure, and dry it in a gentle oven; or decorate it instead with leaves of almond paste, fastening them to it with white of egg. Just before it is sent to table, fill it with well-drained whipped cream, flavoured as for a trifle or in any other way to the taste.
POMMES AU BEURRE.
(Buttered apples. Excellent.)
Pare six or eight fine apples of a firm but good boiling kind, and core without piercing them through, or dividing them; fill the cavities with fresh butter, put a quarter of a pound more, cut small, into a stewpan just large enough to contain the apples in a single layer, place them closely together on it, and stew them as softly as possible, turning them occasionally until they are almost sufficiently tender to serve; then strew upon them as much sifted sugar as will sweeten the dish highly, and a teaspoonful of pounded cinnamon; shake these well in and upon the fruit, and stew it for a few minutes longer. Lift it out, arrange it in a hot dish, put into each apple as much warm apricot jam as it will contain, and lay a small quantity on the top; pour the syrup from the pan round, but not on the fruit, and serve it immediately.
Apples, 6 to 8; fresh butter, 4 oz., just simmered till tender. Sugar, 6 to 8 oz.; cinnamon, 1 teaspoonful: 5 minutes. Apricot jam as needed.
Obs.—Particular care must be taken to keep the apples entire: they should rather steam in a gentle heat than boil. It is impossible to specify the precise time which will render them sufficiently tender, as this must depend greatly on the time of year and the sort of fruit. If the stewpan were placed in a very slow oven, the more regular heat of it would perhaps be better in its effect than the stewing.