Page:Seventy-Five Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats.djvu/58

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Make an icing with the whites of three eggs, beaten till it stands alone, and twenty-four teaspoonfuls of the best loaf-sugar, powdered, and beaten gradually into the white of egg. Flavour it with a tea-spoonful of rose-water or eight drops of essence of lemon, stirred in at the last. Spread it evenly with a broad knife, over the top of each queen-cake, ornamenting them, (while the icing is quite wet) with red and queen nonpareils, or fine sugar-sand, dropped on carefully, with the thumb and finger.

When the cakes are iced, set them in a warm place to dry; but not too near the fire, as that will cause the icing to crack.[1]


POUND CAKE.

One pound of flour, sifted.
One pound of white sugar, powdered and sifted.
One pound of fresh butter.
Ten eggs.
Half a glass of wine.
Half a glass of brandy. mixed,
Half a glass of rose-water.
Twelve drops of essence of lemon.
A table-spoonful of mixed mace and cinnamon.
A nutmeg, powdered.

Pound the spice and sift it. There should be twice as much cinnamon as mace. Mix the cinnamon, mace, and nutmeg together.

Sift the flour in a broad pan, or wooden bowl. Sift the powdered sugar into a large deep pan, and cut the butter into it, in small pieces. If the weath-

  1. You may colour icing of a fine pink, by mixing with it a few drops of liquid cochineal; which is prepared by boiling very slowly in an earthen or china vessel twenty grains of cochineal powder, twenty grains of cream of tartar, and twenty grains of powdered alum, all dissolved in a gill of soft water, and boiled till reduced to one half. Strain it and cork it up in a small phial. Pink icing should be ornamented with white nonpareils.