Seventy-Five Receipts for Pastry Cakes, and Sweetmeats.
by Miss Leslie.
PREFACE.
The following Receipts for Pastry, Cakes, and Sweetmeats, are original, and have been used by the author and many of her friends with uniform success. They are drawn up in a style so plain and minute, as to be perfectly intelligible to servants, and persons of the most moderate capacity. All the ingredients, with their proper quantities, are enumerated in a list at the head of each receipt, a plan which will greatly facilitate the business of procuring and preparing the requisite articles.
There is frequently much difficulty in following directions in English and French Cookery Books, not only from their want of explicitness, but from the difference in the fuel, fire-places, and cooking utensils, generally used in Europe and America; and many of the European receipts are, so complicated and laborious, that our female cooks are afraid to undertake the arduous task of making any thing from them.
The receipts in this little book are, in every sense of the word, American; but the writer flatters herself that (if exactly followed) the articles produced from them will not be found inferior to any of a similar description made in the European manner. Experience has proved, that pastry, cakes, &c. prepared _precisely_ according to these directions will not fail to be excellent: but where economy is expedient, a portion of the seasoning, that is, the spice, wine, brandy, rosewater, essence of lemon, &c. may be omitted without any essential deviation of flavour, or difference of appearance; retaining, however, the given proportions of eggs, butter, sugar, and flour.
But if done at home, and by a person that can be trusted, it will be proved, on trial, that any of these articles may be made in the best and most liberal manner at _one half_ of the cost of the same articles supplied by a confectioner. And they will be found particularly useful to families that live in the country or in small towns, where nothing of the kind is to be purchased.
PART THE FIRST.
PASTRY
The eggs should not be beaten till after all the other ingredients are ready, as they will fail very soon. If the whites and yolks are to be beaten separately, do the whites first, as they will stand longer.
Eggs should be beaten in a broad shallow pan, spreading wide at the top. Butter and sugar should be stirred in a deep pan with straight sides.
Break every egg by itself, in a saucer, before you put it into the pan, that in case there should be any bad ones, they may not spoil the others.
Eggs are beaten most expeditiously with rods. A small quantity of white of egg may be beaten with a knife, or a three-pronged fork.
There can be no positive rules as to the exact time of baking each article. Skill in baking is the result of practice, attention, and experience. Much, of course, depends on the state of the fire, and on the size of the things to be baked, and something on the thickness of the pans or dishes.
If you bake in a stove, put some bricks in the oven part to set the pans or plates on, and to temper the heat at the bottom. Large sheets of iron, without sides, will be found very useful for small cakes, and to put under the pans or plates.
PUFF PASTE.
Half a pound and two ounces of sifted flour.
Half a pound of the best fresh butter--washed.
A little cold water.
_This will make puff-paste for two Puddings, or for one soup-plate Pie, or for four small Shells_.
Weigh half a pound and two ounces of flour, and sift it through a hair-sieve into a large deep dish. Take out about one fourth of the flour, and lay it aside on one corner of your pasteboard, to roll and sprinkle with.
Wash, in cold water, half a pound of the best fresh butter.
Squeeze it hard with your hands and make it up into a round lump.
Divide it in four equal parts; lay them on one side of your paste-board, and have ready a glass of cold water.
Cut one of the four pieces of butter into the pan of flour. Cut it as small as possible. Wet it gradually with a very little water (too much water will make it tough) and mix it well with the point of a large case-knife. Do not touch it with your hands. When the dough gets into a lump, sprinkle on the middle of the board some of the flour that you laid aside, and lay the dough upon it, turning it out of the pan with the knife.
Rub the rolling-pin with flour, and sprinkle a little on the lump of paste. Roll it out thin, quickly, and evenly, pressing on the rolling-pin very lightly. Then take the second of the four pieces of butter, and, with the point of your knife, stick it in little bits at equal distances all over the sheet of paste. Sprinkle on some flour, and fold up the dough. Flour the paste-board and rolling-pin again; throw a little flour on the paste and roll it out a second time. Stick the third piece of butter all over it in little bits. Throw on some flour, fold up the paste, sprinkle a little more flour on the dough, and on the rolling-pin, and roll it out a third time, always pressing on it lightly. Stick it over with the fourth and last piece of butter. Throw on a little more flour, fold up the paste and then roll it out in a large round sheet. Cut off the sides, so as to make the sheet of a square form, and lay the slips of dough upon the square sheet. Fold it up with the small pieces of trimmings, in the inside. Score or notch it a little with the knife; lay it on a plate and set it away in a cool place, but not where it can freeze, as that will make it heavy.
Having made the paste, prepare and mix your pudding or pie. When the mixture is finished, bring out your paste, flour the board and rolling-pin, and roll it out with a short quick stroke, and pressing the rolling-pin rather harder than while you were putting the butter in. If the paste rises in blisters, it will be light, unless spoiled in baking.
Then cut the sheet in half, fold up each piece and roll them out once more, separately, in round sheets the size of your plate.
Press on rather harder, but not too hard. Roll the sheets thinnest in the middle and thickest at the edges. If intended for puddings, lay them in buttered soup-plates, and trim them evenly round the edges. If the edges do not appear thick enough, you may take the trimmings, put them all together, roll them out, and having cut them in slips the breadth of the rim of the plate, lay them all round to make the paste thicker at the edges, joining them nicely and evenly, as every patch or crack will appear distinctly when baked. Notch the rim handsomely with a very sharp knife. Fill the dish with the mixture of the pudding, and bake it in a moderate oven. The paste should be of a light brown colour. If the oven is too slow, it will be soft and clammy; if too quick, it will not have time to rise as high as it ought to do.
In making the best puff-paste, try to avoid using more flour to sprinkle and roll with, than the small portion which you have laid aside for that purpose at the beginning. If you make the dough too soft at first, by using too much water, it will be sticky, and require more flour, and will eventually be tough when baked. Do not put your hands to it, as their warmth will injure it. Use the knife instead. Always roll from you rather than to you, and press lightly on the rolling-pin, except at the last.
It is difficult to make puff-paste in the summer, unless in a cellar, or very cool room, and on a marble table. The butter should, if possible, be washed the night before, and kept covered with ice till you use it next day. The water should have ice in it, and the butter should be iced as it sets on the paste-board.
After the paste is mixed, it should be put in a covered dish, and set in cold water till you are ready to give it the last rolling.
With all these precautions to prevent its being heavy, it will not rise as well, or be in any respect as good as in cold weather.
The handsomest way of ornamenting the edge of a pie or pudding is to cut the rim in large square notches, and then fold over triangularly one corner of every notch.
COMMON PASTE FOR PIES.
A pound and a half of sifted flour.
Three quarters of a pound of butter--washed.
_This will make one large pie or two small ones_.
Sift the flour into a pan. Cut the butter into two equal parts.
Cut one half of the butter into the flour, and cut it up as small as possible. Mix it well with the flour, wetting it gradually with a little cold water.
Spread some flour on your paste-board, take the lump of paste out of the pan, flour your rolling-pin, and roll out the paste into a large sheet. Then stick it over with the remaining half of the butter in small pieces, and laid at equal distances. Throw on a little flour, fold up the sheet of paste, flour it slightly, and roll it out again. Then fold it up, and cut it in half or in four, according to the size of your pies. Roll it out into round sheets the size of your pie-plates, pressing rather harder on the rolling-pin.
Butter your pie-plates, lay on your under crust, and trim the edge. Fill the dish with the ingredients of which the pie is composed, and lay on the lid, in which you must prick some holes, or cut a small slit in the top. Crimp the edges with a sharp knife.
Heap up the ingredients so that the pie will be highest in the middle.
Some think it makes common paste more crisp and light, to beat it hard on both sides with the rolling-pin, after you give it the first rolling, when all the butter is in.
If the butter is very fresh, you may mix with the flour a salt-spoonful of salt.
MINCE PIES
One pound and a half of boiled beef's heart, or fresh tongue--chopped when cold.
Two pounds of beef suet, chopped fine.
Four pounds of pippin apples, chopped.
Two pounds of raisins, stoned and chopped.
Two pounds of currants, picked, washed, and dried.
Two pounds of powdered sugar.
One quart of white wine.
One quart of brandy.