VINTAGE RECIPES

[Welland Telegraph November 1900]

Gingerbread Loaf

Melt four ounces of butter in a basin and stir into it by degrees a teaspoonful of molasses. Add half a teaspoon of mixed spice, one teaspoonful of ground ginger, one teaspoonful of carbonate of soda and a teacupful of warm milk. Sprinkle in sufficient flour (stirring the ingredients all the time) to bring the cake mixture to the consistency of a thick batter, beat it well, add two tablespoonfuls of split raisins which have been slightly dredged with flour, and a tablespoonful of chopped lemon peel, candied. Butter a cake tin, dust it with flour, pour in the mixture and bake it in a moderately quick oven.

To make them, soak one cupful of stale bread crumbs in one cupful of milk for thirty minutes. Then add to the mixture the beaten yolk of one egg, one half tablespoonful of melted butter, one half teaspoonful of salt and three-quarters cupful of flour. Beat until smooth and fold carefully one tablespoonful of baking powder and stiffly beaten white of the egg. Bake in  gem pans for half an hour. The oven should be quick.

One cup of squash as prepared for the table, a cup of milk, two tablespoonfuls of sugar, a tablespoonful of melted butter, a teaspoonful of baking powder sifted with flour enough to make a dough as thin as possibly can be handled. Roll out, cut in biscuit shape and bake. If preferred the batter may be thinner and dropped in muffin rings.

A good firm head should be soaked in slightly salted cold water for at least an hour. It is then drained, put in a saucepan with boiling water, salted again and simmered gently for fifteen minutes. Drain once more, and separate the cauliflower into flowerets, putting the pieces in a baking dish with a little boiling milk, butter and seasoning of salt and pepper. Sprinkle the top with cracker or bread crumbs, and put in oven long enough to brown.

A delicious pudding is made from apples in this way,–Take six, peel and core them and fill the centre with sugar. Arrange the apples in a baking dish, add a quarter of a cup of water, cover and bake until nearly done. Then pour over them a batter made with four eggs, a pint of milk, a scant pint of flour sifted, with a teaspoonful each of salt and baking powder. Bake about twenty minutes and serve with hard sauce.

One cup dates cut fine, 2 cups sweet milk, 1 large spoon butter, 1 teaspoon baking powder and 3 cups flour. One beaten egg should be stirred in with the flour. Bake in gem pans 20 minutes in a hot oven. Chopped dried fruit may be substantiated for the dates.

Cook half a cup of bread crumbs and a cup and a half of milk over hot water for twenty minutes. Add a tablespoon of butter, salt and pepper to season. Brown half a cup of bread crumbs in a tablespoonful of butter and sprinkle liberally over both timbales and sauce.