SC - re: missing digests/WS menu

[Mordonnade@aol.com]

At 4:14 PM -0500 2/1/98, Brangwayna wrote:

>Today I made my first try at redacting anything by myself.  I used the "Fine
>cakes" recipe that was posted here right before Christmas.  Here are the
>results:
>
Have a look at this recipe for comparison--it is English 17th c., so close
in time and place to yours, and has the advantage that there are quantities
in the original.

To Make an Excellent Cake
The Closet of Sir Kenelm Digby, Opened

To a peck of fine flour take six pounds of fresh butter, which must be
tenderly melted, ten pounds of currants, of cloves and mace, 1/2 an ounce
of each, an ounce of cinnamon, 1/2 an ounce of nutmegs, four ounces of
sugar, one pint of sack mixed with a quart at least of thick barm of ale
(as soon as it is settled to have the thick fall to the bottom, which will
be when it is about two days old), half a pint of rosewater; 1/2 a quarter
of an ounce of saffron. Then make your paste, strewing the spices, finely
beaten, upon the flour: then put the melted butter (but even just melted)
to it; then the barm, and other liquours: and put it into the oven well
heated presently. For the better baking of it, put it in a hoop, and let it
stand in the oven one hour and a half. You ice the cake with the whites of
two eggs, a small quantity of rosewater, and some sugar. [end of original]

Scaled down: (1/16th)
2 c flour
3/8 lb = 1 1/2 sticks of butter
5/8 lb currants = 2 c = 10 oz
1/4 t cloves
1/4 t mace
1/2 t cinnamon
1/4 t nutmeg
1/2 T sugar
2 T sack (or sherry)
1/4 c ale yeast settled out of homemade mead or beer (or 1 t  dried yeast
dissolved in 3 T water)
1 T rosewater
8 threads saffron

Icing:
1/8 egg white (about 2 t)	1/4 t rosewater 	2 T sugar

Mix flour, spices, and sugar. Melt butter, mix up yeast mixture, and crush
the saffron in the rosewater to extract the color. When the butter is
melted, stir it into the flour mixture, then add sack, yeast mixture, and
rosewater-saffron mixture. Stir this until smooth, then stir in currants.
Bake at 350° in a greased 10" round pan or a 7"x11" rectangular pan for 40
minutes. Remove from pan and spread with a thin layer of icing; We usually
cut it up into bar cookies.

Elizabeth/Betty Cook


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