It will be improved by the addition of a pound of raisins, stoned, cut in half, and well dredged with wheat flour to prevent their sinking to the bottom. Sultana or seedless raisins are best for all sorts of cakes and puddings.
CAROLINA RICE CAKES.—Having picked and washed half a pint of rice, boil it by itself till the grains lose all form and are dissolved into a thick mass, or jelly. While warm, mix into it a large lump of the best fresh butter, and a salt-spoonful of salt. Pour into a bowl, a moderate sized teacupful of ground rice-flour; and add to it as much milk as will make a tolerably stiff batter. Stir it till it is quite smooth, and free from lumps. Then mix it thoroughly with the boiled rice. Beat six eggs as light as possible, and stir them, gradually, into the mixture. Bake it on a griddle, in cakes about as large round as a saucer. Eat them warm with butter; and have on the table, in a small bowl, some powdered white sugar and nutmeg, for those who like it.
CAROLINA CORN CAKES.—Mix together in a pan, a pint and a half of sifted corn meal, and a half pint of wheat flour, adding a heaped salt-spoon of salt. Beat three eggs very light. Have ready a quart of sour milk. (You can turn sweet milk sour by stirring into it a very little vinegar.) Put into a teacup a small tea-spoonful of carbonate of soda, and dissolve it in a little lukewarm water. In another teacup melt a salt-spoonful of tartaric acid. Add, alternately, to the milk, the beaten eggs and the mixed meal, a little at a time of each; stirring very hard. Then stir in the melted soda, and lastly the dissolved tartaric acid. Having stirred the whole well together, butter some square pans; fill them with the batter; set them immediately into a hot oven; and bake them well. Serve them up hot, and eat them with butter or molasses, or both. These cakes may be baked in muffin rings. All hot cakes in the form of muffins should be pulled open with the fingers when about to be eaten; and not split with a knife, the pressure of the knife tending to make them heavy.
MADISON CAKE.—A pint and a half of sifted yellow corn meal.—Half a pint of wheat flour.—Half a pint of sour milk.—Half a pint of powdered white sugar.—Half a pound of fresh butter.—Six eggs.—A gill, or two wine-glasses of brandy.—A pound of raisins of the best quality.—A large tea-spoonful of mixed spice, powdered mace, nutmeg, and cinnamon.—A large salt-spoon of sal-eratus, or a small tea-spoonful of soda. If you have no sour milk at hand, turn half a pint of rich milk sour by setting it in the sun, or stirring in a tea-spoonful of vinegar. For this cake the milk must be sour, that the sal-eratus or soda may act more powerfully by coming in contact with an acid. The acidity will then be entirely removed by the effervescence, and the cake will be rendered very light, and perfectly sweet. Having powdered the spice, put it into the brandy, and let it infuse till wanted. Prepare the raisins by stoning them, and cutting them in half; dredging them well with flour. They should be muscadel, or bloom raisins, or sultana; if the latter, they will require no seeding. Low-priced raisins, of inferior quality, should never be used for cooking or for any purpose, as they are unwholesome.
Sift the corn meal and the wheat flour into a pan, and mix them well. In another pan mix the butter and sugar, and stir them together with a hickory spaddle (which is like a short mush-stick, only broader at the flattened end) till they are light and creamy. Then add the brandy and spice. In a broad, shallow pan, beat the eggs till very thick and smooth. Then stir them gradually into the butter and sugar in turn with the meal. Dissolve the sal-eratus or soda in a very little lukewarm water, and stir it into the sour milk. Then, while foaming, add the milk to the rest of the mixture, and stir very hard. Lastly, throw in the raisins, a few at a time, and give the whole a hard stirring.
Butter a deep square pan or a turban-mould. Put in the mixture. Set it directly into a brisk oven, and bake it at least three hours; or four if in a turban-mould. When half done, the heat should be increased. This cake should be eaten the day it is baked.