THE
BREAD AND BISCUIT BAKER’S
AND
SUGAR-BOILER’S ASSISTANT

Including a large variety of Modern Recipes

FOR

BREAD — TEA CAKES — HARD AND FANCY BISCUITS — BUNS — GINGERBREADS — SHORTBREADS — PASTRY — CUSTARDS — FRUIT CAKES — SMALL GOODS FOR SMALL MASTERS — CONFECTIONS IN SUGAR — LOZENGES — ICE CREAMS — PRESERVING FRUIT — CHOCOLATE, ETC., ETC.

WITH REMARKS ON

THE ART OF BREAD-MAKING

AND

CHEMISTRY AS APPLIED TO BREAD-MAKING

BY

ROBERT WELLS

PRACTICAL BAKER, CONFECTIONER, AND PASTRYCOOK, SCARBOROUGH

Second Edition, with Additional Recipes.

LONDON
CROSBY LOCKWOOD AND SON
7, STATIONERS’ HALL COURT, LUDGATE HILL
1890

[All rights reserved.]

PREFACE.

In submitting the following pages for public approval, the Author hopes that the work may prove acceptable and useful to the Baking Trade as a Book of Instruction for Learners, and for daily reference in the Shop and Bakehouse; and having exercised great care in its compilation, he believes that in all its details it will be found a trustworthy guide.

From his own experience in the Baker’s business, he is satisfied that a book of this kind, embodying in a handy form the accumulated results of the work of practical men, is really wanted; and as in the choice of Recipes he has been guided by an intimate acquaintance with the requirements of the trade, and as every recipe here given has been tested by actual and successful use, he trusts that the labour which he has bestowed upon the preparation of the work may be rewarded by its wide acceptance by his brethren in the trade.

The work being divided into sections, as shown in the Contents, and a full Index having been added, reference can readily be made, as occasion may arise, either to a class of goods, or to a particular recipe.

Any suggestions for the improvement of the work, which the experience of others may lead them to propose, will, if communicated to the Author, be gratefully esteemed and carefully dealt with in future editions.

Scarborough,
October, 1888.

ADVERTISEMENT TO THE SECOND EDITION.

It is very gratifying to both Author and Publishers that this little book has been so favourably received by the Baking Trade and the public that a second edition is required within a few months of the first issue of the work.

The opportunity has been taken to insert some additional recipes for the whole-meal and other breads which of late have been so frequently recommended as substitutes for the white bread in established use, together with some remarks on the subject by Professors Jago and Graham; and a few corrections in the text (the necessity for which escaped notice when the work was first in the press) have also been made.

August, 1889.

CONTENTS.

BREAD AND BISCUIT BAKING, Etc.

THE BREAD AND BISCUIT BAKER’S ASSISTANT.

I. INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER.

When we reflect upon the present conditions under which the bread-making industry is carried on in most of the large cities and towns of England, Scotland, and Ireland, and remember the importance of that industry to mankind, we cannot but be impressed by the little progress that has been made in the art of bread-making. Whilst other industries have been marked by important improvements, we find bread being made in much the same manner as it was five hundred years ago. The mystery is how—by accident, it would seem—we get such well-made bread as we do. There are very few even now who have the slightest conception of what yeast really is, and fewer still who know how or why it makes bread light. But it will surprise me if the trade does not undergo, in the course of the next ten years, a complete and beneficial change.

Master bakers and confectioners are everywhere complaining of the incompetency of their workmen; and it cannot be denied that there is some ground for the complaint. Proper training in the baking and confectionery trade is of great importance. A trained servant gives satisfaction to his employer, and receives a responsive good feeling in return.

Let us see what is meant by “training.” In its broadest and best sense, it is knowing what to do, and when and how to do it.

Take the first condition—What to do. This may be considered on two grounds, generally known as the practical and the theoretical, though the latter is sometimes confounded with the scientific, and people are led to sneer at science. Much has been said lately in our trade journals about introducing scientific chemistry to the journeyman baker in connection with his daily work of making bread. But how many journeyman bakers could we find that even understand the meaning of the word chemistry, without expecting them to understand mysteries to which years of study have been devoted by such men as Liebig, Graham, Dumas, Darwin, Pasteur, and Thoms of Alyth?

Chemistry as applied to Bread-Making.

It is not my intention to depreciate the great good that would be derived from scientific chemistry if properly applied to bread-making. But who is to study and apply it? Surely not a man who earns from 20s. to 30s. per week, and works twelve, fourteen, and sixteen hours a day in an overheated atmosphere. What hours of rest he has should be used to recuperate his lost vitality. Not till scientific chemistry is taught in our Board schools and made one of the elements of a scholar’s ordinary education, can we hope to see it used successfully with bakers in making bread.

Chemistry, I believe, is destined to play as important a part in the annals of the baking trade as did the substitution of machinery for hand labour. But at the present day how many bakers know that the decomposition of sugar produces fermentation; that fermentation destroys sugar and produces alcohol; that maltose assists fermentation; that starch, however obtained, has always the same characteristics, though there are different kinds from different sources; that dextrine is soluble in water and insoluble in alcohol; that protoplasm, the basis of all life, consists of protein, compounds, mineral salts, nitrogen, &c.? And do not the meaning and use of terms familiar in scientific chemistry—such as diastase, cerealin, gluten, and others—only perplex the ordinary journeyman baker, and make him think that the less he has to do with science, the more easily he will get his life “rubbed through.” It is impossible for working bakers to become acquainted with these things while in the bakehouse; and while there are in many towns such valuable institutions as free libraries, mechanics’ institutes, &c., they are not available to the ordinary baker, as his hours are so exceptional. The baker’s hours of labour, indeed, are shorter in many places than they used to be, and he is no longer called “the white slave.” Still, the spirit of competition is so strong that a baker has to work much harder proportionally than other working men, and his mind is in no condition, in the little spare time he has, to study the problems of science; and nobody can expect the baker to know, as it were by intuition, the whys and the wherefores of chemistry. However, what he has learnt in the practice of his art, and what the common custom of the trade has handed down to him, he may use to more or less advantage, according as he has more or less personal skill. In the case of fermentation, which may be described as the very backbone of bread-making, a baker will find plenty to study and to think about, from his first “setting the sponge” until his bread is out of the oven, without perplexing himself over problems about which he can understand little or nothing.

With time and money at his disposal, however, the study of chemistry opens up a wide field to the studious baker, and would no doubt reward him for his pains, and at the same time prove a great gain to his trade; and I believe there are not a few earnest workers labouring at the present time to afford that knowledge and help to the journeyman baker which will eventually lead to an easier way of earning his daily bread.

Fermentation.

The process of fermentation, which has for its object either the manufacture of bread, or of an alcoholic product in a more or less concentrated form, is very similar in action during its earlier stages. It commences with the growth and multiplication of the fermenting germs contained in the minute organisms floating in the air, the inorganic constituents of the water, and the protoplasm (essence of life) of the yeast; and all the changes brought about are accompanied by heat. Fermentation is caused by the decomposition of the starch and gluten of a solution of either potatoes, flour, or malted barley, which decomposition is accompanied by an evolution of gas. There is also a peculiar vibration given to the various bodies in contact, which agitates the whole. This agitation is increased by the bursting of the starch-cells and the formation therefrom of maltose, and also by the changing of the maltose sugar into carbonic acid gas. Substances in a state of decomposition are capable of bringing about a change in the chemical composition of bodies with which they are in contact. Most of the vegetable substances used in fermentation have a constituent part—sugar, starch, or some other substance—which is easily converted into a fermentable sugar by the action of yeast, or of diluted mineral acids, or by a constituent of malted barley, called diastase. The sugar produced by these means is resolved into carbonic acid gas and alcohol by vinous fermentation. It will be seen, therefore, that fermentation is started by the saccharine element in the ferment, which is termed maltose; the process is then kept up by the gluten, which, becoming decomposed, aids the sugar and starch in the work of providing food for the yeast as soon as the latter is brought in contact with it. The fermentation then takes place very rapidly, and carbonic acid gas is generated and given off in proportion to the amount of the products contained in the ferment, or sponge, and also to the strength and freshness of the yeast: especially is this so with gluten, which is the great agent of fermentation, when in a state of decomposition and when in contact with yeast.

Process of Bread-Making.

It will be useful to give here some remarks by the great scientist, Liebig, on the best process of making bread:—

“Many chemists are of opinion that flour by the fermentation in the dough loses somewhat of its nutritious constituents, from a decomposition of the gluten; and it has been proposed to render the dough porous without fermentation by means of substances which when brought into contact yield carbonic acid. But on a closer investigation of the process this view appears to have little foundation.

“When flour is made into dough with water, and allowed to stand at a gentle warmth, a change takes place in the gluten of the dough, similar to that which occurs after the steeping of barley in the commencement of germination in the seeds in the preparation of malt; and in consequence of this change the starch (the greater part of it in malting; in dough only a small percentage) is converted into sugar, a small portion of the gluten passes into the soluble state, in which it acquires the properties of albumen, but by this change it loses nothing whatever of its digestibility or of its nutritive value.

“We cannot bring flour and water together without the formation of sugar from the starch, and it is this sugar and not the gluten of which a part enters into fermentation, and is resolved into alcohol and carbonic acid.

“We know that malt is not inferior in nutritive power to barley from which it is derived, although the gluten contained in it has undergone a much more profound alteration than that of flour in the dough, and experience has taught us that in distilleries where spirits are made from potatoes, the plastic constituents of the potatoes, and of the malt which is added after having gone through the entire course of the processes of the formation and the fermentation of the sugar, have lost little or nothing of their nutritive value. It is certain, therefore, that in the making of bread there is no loss of gluten.

“Only a small part of the starch of the flour is consumed in the production of sugar, and the fermentative process is not only the simplest and best but also the cheapest of all the methods which have been recommended for rendering bread porous. Besides, chemical preparations ought never, as a rule, to be recommended by chemists, for culinary purposes, since they hardly ever are found pure in ordinary commerce. For example, the commercial crude muriatic acid which it is recommended to add to the dough along with bicarbonate of soda, is always most impure, and often contains arsenic, so that the chemist never uses it without a tedious process of purification for his purposes, which are of far less importance than making bread light and porous.

“To make bread cheaper it has been proposed to add to dough potato starch or dextrine, rice, the pressed pulp of turnips, pressed raw potatoes, or boiled potatoes; but all these additions only diminish the nutritive value of bread. Potato starch, dextrine, or the pressed pulp of turnips, and beet-root, when added to flour, yield a mixture the nutritive value of which is equal to the entire potato, or lower still, but no one can consider the change of grain or flour into a food of equal value with potatoes or rice an improvement. The true problem is to render the potatoes or rice similar or equal to wheat in their effects, and not vice versâ. It is better under all circumstances to boil the potatoes and eat them as such, than to add potatoes or potato starch to flour before it is made into bread, which should be strictly prohibited by police regulation on account of the cheating to which it would inevitably give rise.”

Brown Bread.

With regard to the nutritive qualities of brown bread, Professor Jago (who I think one of our highest authorities) says that whole meal, and flour from which the bran and germ have not been removed, do not keep well. These bodies contain oil and nitrogenous principles which readily decompose, producing rancidity and mustiness in flavour. Not only do these changes occur in the flour, but they also proceed apace in the dough. The diastastic bodies of the bran and germ attack the starch, and more or less convert it into dextrine and maltose; they further attack the gluten, and that remarkably elastic body which confers on wheaten flour, alone of all the cereals, the power of forming a light, spongy, well-risen loaf. The gluten, under the action of the bran and germ, loses its elasticity, and becomes fragile and incapable of retaining the gas produced during fermentation; the result is heavy, sodden, indigestible bread.

Evidence of this is found in the fact that while whole-meal loaves are so excessively baked as to produce a crust two or three times the ordinary thickness, the interior is still in a damp and sodden condition. This is the effect of bran in whole-meal.

“Not only, then, on the ground of nutritive value may the use of a pure white loaf be urged, but such bread is more healthily made, and will be sweet and free from acidity when whole-meal and dark breads are sour and unwholesome. It has also been pointed out that the nutritive constituents of the bran are so locked within it that they escape unaltered from the human body.”

Such, in brief, is Professor Jago’s opinion of whole-meal, and bread made from it. My own opinion is that Darwin’s theory of the survival of the fittest is very forcibly illustrated in the milling of cereals, and the adoption of food most proper for the human system. We have had brown bread and white bread before the public from time immemorial, and what is the result? Why, for every sack of wheat-meal bread which is baked we have a thousand sacks of fine or white bread. And what of our hospitals and our army and navy, with medical men at the head of them, watching the results of this food or that food, and its effects on the human body? I admit that brown bread does suit some constitutions; but to the majority of people it is nauseous, frequently causing flatulency. I will just quote another good authority—Professor Charles Graham.

In his lecture upon “The Chemistry of Bread-Making,” delivered before the Society of Arts in December, 1879, he said: “As regards the importance of the constituents of bran, I say that the analyst, and the physician who makes use of the analyst as his supporter, in bringing before us the importance of brown bread as compared with white, and who assert that in rejecting the bran we are guilty of a serious waste of flesh-forming and bone-forming material, should not take a mere chemical analysis as all-sufficient to establish their point. A table showing, from an analyst’s point of view, the comparative merits of various substances for feeding purposes, shows hay to be of high value as a food, and even oat straw—as, indeed, every farmer knows from experience. Still more valuable for their heat-giving, and especially for their flesh-forming, materials, are linseed-cake, rape-cake, and decorticated cotton-cake. Now those who hold, from mere chemical analysis, that bran is of such high value as a food material that its omission from flour would meet with grave censure, should, from a similar analytical standpoint, urge us to eat hay, oat-straw, linseed and cotton cakes. Doubtless these substances are of high value as food for cattle, because the herbivorous oxen can digest and utilise them with ease; not so with man, who would starve in a field where a cow or a sheep would fatten. As with hay or linseed cake, so with bran; I hold that the best mode of digesting such food substances is first of all by the aid of our hoofed friends, to convert them into milk or cream, or bacon, beef, or mutton.”

Now these are the scientific opinions of two of our very highest authorities. But of late I have been making brown bread out of a blend of cereals made and milled by an enterprising firm of millers in the North of England, and I must really say that it meets a long-felt want, as it produces a brown loaf which is free from that nauseous taste of which complaint is so often made with brown bread, and has a good nutty flavour of its own.

In conclusion, let me say that we have reason for great hope for the future of the Bread and Confectionery trade. Many earnest minds are devoting both time and money to the development of this important industry, and their efforts cannot fail to result in bettering the knowledge and lightening the labour of the practical baker.

II. GENERAL REMARKS ON BAKING.

Baking as a business or profession has never been confined to the making of bread alone—that is to say, bread in everyday use. A baker we take to mean a person who bakes and prepares any farinaceous substance intended for human food. Therefore baking not only includes loaf-bread baking, biscuit baking, fancy-bread baking, but also pastry-making and confectionery. It is common for all these branches to be practised by the same person, and it is therefore fitting that they should all be treated of in a work of this kind. This we intend doing under separate heads.

Essentials of Good Bread-Making.

Two of the most essential things in bread-baking, in order to produce a full-flavoured, showy, and sweet loaf, are good yeast and good flour. A good oven is also necessary. An oven which is either too hot or too cold will spoil what would otherwise be a good batch of bread: so great care should be used in order to have the oven of the proper heat. Pan bread, or bread baked in tins, need a greater heat than batch bread, as pan-bread dough is of a lighter nature than batch-bread dough, and consequently requires more heat to keep it up. I do not intend, however, going into the merits of different ovens, as I am not competent to do so. There are so many different kinds, and each baker, as a rule, seems to fancy what he has been most used to. For heating purposes, cinders have taken the place of coals and wood, and (I think) to the advantage of both master and journeyman. Cinders are cheaper for the master and cleaner for the workman.

German Yeast and Parisian Barm.

Yeasts, or barms, are of many varieties, but I purpose here to deal with only two kinds—that commonly known as German yeast, which is mostly used in England, and Parisian barm, the kind most in use in Scotland.

A great point in working German yeast is to know when it is in proper condition, as it is very liable to go bad in very warm weather, or if kept in a very warm place. Care should be taken to keep it in a place as near a temperature of 56° to 60° Fahr. as possible. Should there be any suspicion that the yeast is not up to the mark, a simple and sure test is to get a clean cup or tumbler, half fill it with warm water of a temperature of 100°, put an ounce of loaf sugar in the water, and when dissolved add one ounce of yeast. The yeast will, of course, sink to the bottom, but if it is sound and in good condition it will rise to the top in two minutes. Should it take much longer than that, the less you have to do with it the better.

Parisian barm makes a nice showy loaf, but for flavour I prefer German yeast. To make Parisian barm 1 gallon of water is put into a pan at, say, 140° Fahr.; weigh 2 lbs. of crushed malt, put it into the water at the above temperature, cover it up for about three hours; one hour before you are going to make your barm, that is two hours since you put your malt to steep, put 3 gallons of water into a large pan, put it on the fire; when it boils, add 2 oz. of good fresh hops, well boil for twenty minutes; after which well strain the malt through a hair sieve. Put it into the barm tub and add as much flour as can be nicely stirred in with the barm-stick. Then put the boiling hop-water through a sieve on top of the malt water and flour and well stir it. It should be properly scalded. Some put the hops in a small linen bag made for the purpose and put it in the boiling water, squeezing it against the side of the pot before taking it out. Supposing it to be five o’clock in the afternoon, it may be put by with a couple of sacks over it till five o’clock next morning. Then “set the barm away” (as they say in Scotland), by adding to the above liquid half a gallon of the barm previously made.

After the old barm is added to the new, in a few hours a scum gathers on the top. This scum will either start at the side of the tub and work gradually to the other side, or I have seen it start in the middle and work itself slowly to the sides of the tub. When ready it should have a nice clear bell top. It takes from ten to twelve hours to work before it is ready.

By following this method one may always have good barm. Cleanliness is very essential for barm, and care should be taken that neither grease nor churned milk shall get near it. We need scarcely say that experience is required in this as in other things.

American Patent Yeast.

I may add the following recipe for American patent yeast:—Take half a pound of hops and two pailfuls of water; mix and boil them till the liquid is reduced one half; strain the decoction into a tub, and when luke-warm add half a peck of malt. In the meantime, put the strained-off hops again into two pailfuls of water, and boil as before till they are reduced one half; strain the liquid while hot into a tub. (The heat will not injuriously affect malt previously mixed with tepid water.) When the liquid has cooled down to about blood heat, strain off the malt and add to the liquor two quarts of patent yeast set apart from the previous making by the above process. Five gallons of good yeast may thus be made which will be ready for use the day after it is made. It takes about eight hours’ time to manufacture, but gives very little trouble to the baker.

Good or Bad Flour.

Experience is also necessary to judge of flour; but any one in the habit of using flour may form a pretty accurate idea whether it is good or bad. If fine and white, it may be considered good so far as colour is concerned; but if it be brown, it shows that it was either made from inferior wheat, or has been coarsely dressed—that is, that it contains particles of bran. However, brown flour may be of a good sound quality, and fine white flour may not.

To judge of flour, take a portion in your hand and press it firmly between the thumb and forefinger, at the same time rubbing it gently for the purpose of making a level surface upon the flour; or take a watch with a smooth back and press it firmly on the flour. By this means its colour may be ascertained by observing the pressed or smooth surface. If the flour feels loose and lively in the hand, it is of good quality; if it feels dead or damp, or, in other words, clammy, it is decidedly bad. Flour ought to be a week or two old before being used.

Alum in Bread.

A common custom to improve flour was to add a small quantity of alum to a sack of flour—a custom which, it may be hoped, is entirely a thing of the past. According to Liebig, the action of alum in the process of bread-making is to form certain insoluble combinations which render digestion difficult, and detract largely from the value of bread as food. Professor Vaughan, of the University of Michigan, says: “The use of alum is an adulteration which is injurious to health. It unites with the phosphates in the bread, rendering them insoluble, and preventing their digestion and absorption. In this way, alum, when present, diminishes the nutritive value of bread. While some gain may perhaps temporarily accrue to the manufacturer through the covert perpetration of this fraud, still no good to any one can result therefrom.”

Butter for Pastry and Cakes.

Butter, which so largely enters into the pastrycook’s business, is another important point for consideration. It should be perfectly sweet, and before it is used made smooth on a marble slab. Salt butter made from cows fed on poor pasture is the best for puff paste, and is the most proper for ornamental work; it should be washed in water two or three times before being used. On the other hand, for every kind of cake the butter cannot be too rich.

In the course of this work I likewise intend to touch on the icing of bride and other cakes.

RECIPES.

III. BREAD, TEA CAKES, BUNS, ETC.

1.—To make Home-made Bread.

Put 1 stone of fine flour into your mixing pan; make a hole in the middle of the flour, and press the sides of the hole to prevent the liquid running through; dissolve 2½ ozs. of yeast in 1 gill of water, and put it in the hole made in the flour; mix a little flour in the liquid to make a thin batter, cover your pan over and let it rise to a nice cauliflower top; when ready, dissolve 2½ ozs. of salt in 1 gill of water, put this into your pan, and then take sufficient water (or water and milk) to make all into a nice dough; let it rise a little in the pan, then weigh off into your tins, and prove and bake. The heat of the water should be between 80° and 90° Fahr.

2.—Bread-making by the Old Method.

To make a sack of flour into bread the baker takes the flour and empties it into the kneading trough; it is then carefully passed through a wire sieve, which makes it lie lighter and reduces any lumps that may have formed in it. Next he dissolves 2 oz. of alum (called in the trade “stuff” or “rocky”) in a little water placed over the fire. This is poured into the seasoning tub with a pailful of warm water, but not too hot. When this mixture has cooled to a temperature of about 84 degrees, from 3 to 4 pints of yeast are put into it, and the whole having been strained through the seasoning sieve, it is emptied into a hole made in the mass of flour and mixed up with a portion of it to the consistency of thick batter. Dry flour is then sprinkled over the top. This is called the quarter-sponge, and the operation is known as “setting.” The sponge must then be covered up with sacks, if the weather be cold, to keep it warm. It is then left for three or four hours, when it gradually swells and breaks through the dry flour laid upon its surface. Another pail of water impregnated with alum and salt is now added, and well stirred in, and the mass sprinkled with flour and covered up as before. This is called setting the half-sponge. The whole is then well kneaded with about two more pailfuls of water for about an hour. It is then cut into pieces with a knife, and to prevent spreading it is pinned, or kept at one end of the trough by means of a sprint-board, in which state it is left to “prove,” as the bakers call it, for about four hours. When this process is over the dough is again well kneaded for about half an hour. It is then removed from the trough to the table and weighed into the quantities suitable for each loaf. The operation of moulding, chaffing, and rolling up can be learnt only by practice.

3.—Modern Way of making Bread.

The modern way of making bread is as follows: Put 1 sack, or 20 stone, of flour into the trough, and, to take it all up, sponge 12 gallons of water of the required temperature, and from 10 to 16 ozs. of yeast, according to the strength. Then dissolve 2 lbs. of salt in the water and mix all together. In the morning, or when taken up again, add 6 gallons of water and 1½ lb. of salt. If a quick or “flying” sponge is required to be ready in an hour and a half, empty the sack of flour into the trough. Make a sprint, add 12 gallons of water of the required heat and 2 lbs. of yeast, and as much flour as you can stir in with the hand. Let it rise for one hour and a half; add 6 gallons more water (at the temperature the sponge is set, which should be about 100 degrees Fahr.), and 3½ lbs. of salt. Make all into a nice-sized dough; let it stand three-quarters of an hour, then scale off.

4.—Scotch Style of making Bread.

The bread-making industry has made great strides in Scotland. In Glasgow alone there are two firms which each bake over two thousand bags of flour a week—namely, J. and B. Stevenson and Bilsland Brothers—while five other firms each bake from five hundred to one thousand bags a week. In respect to the output, Scotland is a long way in advance of either England or Ireland. I can well remember the time when oatmeal cakes and scones were the staple food in Scotland; but such food is now notable by its absence. This brings to mind a story I once heard of an Englishman and a Scotchman who were arguing on the merits of their respective countries. The Englishman said, “Man Sandy, you are all fed on oatmeal! Why, in England we only feed our horses on oats.” Sandy’s reply was, “I don’t na but what you say, man, is a’ very true, but where wull ye get sic horses and where wull ye get sic men?”

As I have said before, Parisian barm is the kind most used in Scotland; in fact, nearly all the Scotch advertisements require “men used to Parisian barm.” However, I have noticed lately that German yeast is steadily making its way in the North. The Scotch used generally to make their bread with what they called potato ferment. Now it is mostly quarter or full sponges. To make 1 sack of flour into bread with a quarter sponge take 1 gallon of water of the required temperature, add ½ a gallon of Parisian barm, and sufficient flour to make it into a good stiff dough. This is generally set between one and two o’clock, and is ready to take about half-past four. It should be dropped when ready an inch in the quarter boat or barrel. Empty it into the trough, add 10 gallons of water, dissolve 2 lbs. of salt, and mix all into a well-beaten sponge. Add 6 gallons of water of the required temperature and 1¼ lb. of salt in the morning, or when you take the sponge, and make all into a nice dough. The softer you can work the sponge the clearer and showier will be the loaf.

To make 1 sack of flour with a full sponge, take 1 to 1½ gallons of barm, about 10 gallons of water of the proper temperature with 2 lbs. of salt dissolved in it; make all into a nice-sized sponge. When ready add 6 gallons of water of proper temperature, and 1¼ lb. of salt, and make it into dough.

Care should always be taken to keep the barm clear of grease and churned milk, especially if the milk is sour.

There are a great many substitutes for wheat-flour bread, some of which I will enumerate; but I do not think it needful to give the recipes for them, as the recipes and formulæ I have given are evidently those most popular in the English, Scotch, and Irish bakehouses. Among the many substitutes for wheat bread are the following: bread corn, rice bread, potato bread; bread made of roots, ragwort bread, turnip bread, apple bread, meslin bread, salep bread, Debreczen bread, oat and barley bread. The Norwegians, we are informed, make bread of barley and oatmeal baked between two stones; this bread is said to improve by age, and may be kept for as long as thirty or forty years. At their great festivals the Norwegians use the oldest bread, and it is not unusual at the baptism of infants to have bread made at the time of the baptism of their grandfathers.

5.—Home-made Whole Meal Bread.

Take 1 stone of wheat meal (granulated is best); put your flour in the basin or mixing bowl, and make a hole in the centre of the meal: dissolve 2 ozs. of yeast in a gill and a half of water, about 90° Fahr.; pour the yeast and water into the hole, and mix in as much of the meal as will make a soft batter; cover it up, and when it is ready (which you will know by its having a nice cauliflower top), add 2½ ozs. of salt, and sufficient water, at a temperature of say 80° Fahr., and mix all lightly into a nice mellow dough; put it past, with a cover over it, till you see it commence to rise; then divide it into the sizes required and place in tins to prove; bake in a moderate oven.

Wheat meals, and brown or second flours, do not require so much working, either in the sponge or with the hands, in making it into dough, as do the flours of a finer quality.

6.—Whole Meal Bread.

(For Master Bakers, as generally used in the Trade.)

When setting your ordinary sponges at night for fine bread, dissolve 2½ ozs. of yeast and 2½ ozs. of salt in 1½ gallons of water, about 4° to 6° Fahr., under whatever heat at which you may be setting your fine sponges (according to the nature of the meal you are using); take as much whole meal flour as will make this quantity of water into a weak sponge, and in the morning, when it is ready, give it half a gallon of water off same heat as your fine sponges, with 5 ozs. of salt, and make all lightly into a dough so that there is no “scrape” about it, and work off in the same way as your ordinary bread.

7.—Unfermented, or Diet Bread.

Take 8 lbs. of granulated wheat meal (or meal made with a mixture of barley meal and wheat meal properly blended), 4 ozs. of cream of tartar, and 2 ozs. of carbonate of soda; mix the tartar and soda amongst the flour and sift all through a sieve; make a bay, and add 2 ozs. of crushed salt and 4 ozs. of castor sugar, putting the above in the bay and pouring in a little churned milk to dissolve the salt and sugar; then add as much churned milk as will take the 8 lbs. of meal in, and make into a nice-sized dough; weigh off, and bake in oval tins. They should be put immediately into the oven.

I consider this the very best mode of making wheat meals into bread; bread thus made eats well, and keeps moist longer than fermented meals.

8.—Rye Bread.

Rye bread used to be in greater favour with the public than it now is, but I consider that is owing to the sodden, heavy way in which it is generally made; for if rye flour is properly blended with fine flour, instead of the barley meal generally used, it produces a very nice-flavoured loaf.

Set a sponge at night with fine flour—say, 1 gallon of water, 1½ ozs. of yeast, and 1½ ozs. of salt; let your sponge be about the same consistency as for muffin batter; in the morning add 1 quart of water and 3 ozs. of salt, and make your dough up with rye meal; let your sponge be set of the same heat as for wheat meal bread.

I have adopted this plan, and find it gives general satisfaction. In baking wheat meals, or other meals of the same nature, your oven should be 30° or 40° by the pyrometer under the heat used for fine bread.

9.—Coarse Bread.

Coarse flour (or “overheads,” as it is generally called in the south of Scotland) is the cheapest grade of flour made, and if properly manufactured it will vie with any class of flour in the market for a fine, sweet, nutty flavour; but of course it is dark in colour, and I have seen flour of this grade very strong and carry an exceedingly large quantity of water.

In a test I had some time ago, I produced 110 4-lb. loaves, weighed in dough at 4 lbs. 6 ozs., out of 20 stone of this flour; but I may say that the flour was stone-dressed, and milled in the old style. This same class of flour was in general use in Scotland twenty years ago, and was generally made into coarse or second bread, and coarse “twopennies.” Many a poor family—ay, and rich families too—have thriven and had their hearts made glad on the produce of this grade of flour.

To make Coarse Bread.—Take, say 1 gallon of water, at the same temperature as for wheat meal bread; dissolve 1¼ ozs. of yeast, and the same quantity of salt, in the water; make into an ordinary-sized sponge, and when ready in the morning add half a gallon of water and about 4 ozs. of salt; then make all into a dough, and work off as other doughs.

This flour can be sponged the same way as fine flour for a quick or flying sponge, only care should be used in not setting the sponge too warm, as I find that it ferments and works more quickly than the finer grades of flour.

10.—Germ Flour Bread.

Germ flour is amongst one of the newest kinds of flour placed before the public as a speciality. It is in appearance something like granulated wheat meal, and the vendors of it claim to have found a new process of removing the germ from the flour, and subjecting it to a certain process before it is again mixed with the flour. I am having germ bread made almost daily. Our mode of making it is as follows:—

Dissolve 1½ ozs. of yeast in half a gallon of water, say 90° Fahr., and mix with this about 7 lbs. of germ flour; it should be ready in about an hour and a half; weigh off and prove; use no salt, as we think there is a certain amount of salt (or some substitute for salt) ground amongst the flour. For this class of bread it makes a very nice-eating loaf.

11.—Tea-Cakes.

To be able to make a good tea-cake is considered a great point in the baking trade. The following not only makes good tea-cakes, but also capital Scotch cookies.

Take ½ a gallon of water at, say, 94° Fahr.; add 1 lb. of moist sugar, 5 ozs. of German yeast; dissolve all together, add, say, 1½ lb. of flour and mix. When well risen, add 1 lb. of lard and butter, 2 ozs. of salt, a few currants to taste; mix all together into tea-cake dough. Let it remain in a warm place for about half an hour, then weigh off at 8 or 9 ozs. for 2d.; prove, and bake.

12.—Queen’s Bread.

This can be made with the same dough, but omitting the currants, and making the dough tighter than for tea-cakes; add 1 egg to each pound of dough. Weigh at 3 ounces for a penny, and make into different shapes, such as half-moons, cart-wheels, twists, &c.

13.—Sally Luns, Yorkshire, or Tea Cakes.

Take 1 quart of milk, ¼ lb. of moist sugar, and 2 ozs. of German yeast. Ferment this with a little flour, and when ready, add ½ lb. of butter (some add also 4 eggs to this quantity) and make into dough as for tea-cakes; butter some rings or hoops, and place them on buttered tins, weigh or divide into 5 or 6 ozs. for twopence; mould them round, put them in the hoops, and, when half proved, make a hole in each with a piece of stick. Do not overprove them, or they will eat poor and dry. When baked, which will be in about ten or fifteen minutes, wash over the top with egg and milk.

14.—Muffins.

Sift through the sieve 4 lbs. of good Hungarian flour; take as much water and milk as will make the above into a nice-sized batter, having previously dissolved 2 ozs. of yeast, 1 oz. of sugar, and ¾ oz. of salt in the liquid; then beat this well with your hand for at least ten minutes; after it has half risen in your pan beat again for other ten minutes; then let it stand till ready, which you will know by the batter starting to drop. Have one of your roll-boards well dusted with sifted flour, and with your hand lay out the muffins in rows. The above mixture should produce 24 muffins. Then, with another roll-board slightly dusted with rice flour, take the muffins and with your fingers draw the outsides into the centre, forming a round cake; draw them into your hand and brush off any flour that may be adhering to them; place them on the board dusted with rice, and so on till all are finished; then put them in the prover to prove, which does not take long. The heat of the liquid for muffins (or crumpets) should range from 90° to 100° Fahr., according to the temperature of the bakehouse.

One great point to guard against in fermenting cakes or bread, is to see that your sponge or dough does not get chilled. By the time your muffins are ready, have the stove or hot plate properly heated, then row them gently on to the hot plate so as not to knock the proof out of them; when they are a nice brown turn them gently on the other side and bake a nice delicate brown.

15. Another way.—Some persons now make muffins after the same formula as for tea cakes, namely, moulding one in each hand and pinning out the size required, then proving and baking. I have tried that way more than once, but I cannot get the muffins to appear anything like what my experience teaches me a muffin should be. Practice and judgment are required to make one proficient in muffin-making.

There has recently been introduced to the trade a hot plate heated with gas, which will go a long way in helping the muffin-maker. It is both cleaner, handier, and you can bake with it to a more certain degree of heat.

16.—Crumpets.

Crumpets are generally made by muffin-makers, the most modern formula being the following:—Take 4 lbs. of good English flour, 2 ozs. of good yeast, and 2 ozs. of salt. The flour and salt may be sifted together. Take 1 quart of milk, and 1½ quarts of water, at about 100° Fahr.; dissolve your yeast in the water, then mix in your flour and salt; make all into a thin liquid paste, giving it a thoroughly good mixing; let it stand for one hour, when you may again give it a thoroughly good beat; let it stand for another hour, when it will be ready to bake off. In the meantime thoroughly clean your stove or hot plate before it gets hot, and give it a rub over with a greasy cloth; then have your rings of the size required (they should be half an inch in depth); slightly grease them, and see that they are greased for each round of the hot plate; have a cup in one hand and a saucer in the other to prevent the batter dropping; pour half a cup of the batter into the rings and spread them with a palette knife to a level surface, putting what comes off (if any) back into your pan. Then, when the bottom part is of a nice golden colour, turn them over with your palette knife, turning the ring at the same time, and bake off a nice colour. Remove them from the stove or hot plate, and lay them on clean boards for a couple of minutes, when with a gentle tap your rings will come clear; and so on till finished. Nothing but careful practice, and particular attention to the whys and wherefores of both hot plates and batter, will make a good muffin or crumpet-maker.

17.—Oatmeal Cake.

Take 7 lbs. of medium oatmeal, 1½ oz. salt, 1½ oz. carbonate of soda, 1½ oz. cream of tartar, 1½ lb. of flour, 1½ lb. of lard. Rub the lard in the oatmeal and flour, having previously mixed all the other ingredients in the oatmeal; make a bay, add sufficient cold water to make all into a good working dough, weigh off at 8 ozs., mould up, pin out the size you think most suitable, cut into four, and place on clean dry tins. Bake in a sharp oven.

18.—Bath Buns.

1 lb. of flour, 8 ozs. of butter, 8 ozs. of sugar, 4 eggs, a little warm milk, 1 oz. of Parisian yeast, some citron peel cut small, and half a nutmeg grated. This will make fourteen twopenny buns.

Rub the butter in with the flour, make a bay and break in the eggs, add the yeast with sufficient milk to make the whole into a dough of moderate consistency, and put in a warm place to prove. When it has risen enough mix in the peel, a little essence of lemon, and the sugar, which should be in small pieces about the size of peas. Divide into pieces for buns, prove and bake in gentle heat. They may be washed with egg and dusted with sugar before proving.

19. Another Way.—4 lbs. of flour, 1 lb. of butter, 6 ozs. of sugar, 4 ozs. of yeast, 4 eggs, and sufficient milk to make all into a dough; add essence of lemon.

Warm the milk, add the sugar and yeast with sufficient flour to make a ferment; when ready, add butter, eggs, and remainder of flour, with currants or peel to taste. Weigh or divide into 3 ozs. each, mould them up round egg on top rolled in castor sugar; slightly prove, bake in moderate oven.

20.—Hot Cross Buns.

Take 1 quart of milk or water, 3 ozs. of yeast, 12 ozs. of moist sugar, 12 ozs. of butter, 1 oz. of salt, with sufficient flour to make a nice mellow dough.

Proceed the same as for tea-cakes (p. [24]), adding spice, currants, and peel to taste; weigh 4 ozs. for a penny, make a cross in the middle of the bun, wash over with egg, and prove. Spice, however, is very seldom used, as it tends to darken the buns, and thus giving them a poor appearance. An ingenious apparatus has been invented called a Patent Bun Divider, which greatly facilitates the making of these buns, and cannot fail to be of great service where large quantities of buns or cakes are required to be divided. All that is needed is to weigh 8 lbs. of dough, place it in the pan, and at one stroke of a lever thirty buns or cakes are divided ready to mould.

21.—Chelsea Buns.

Take plain bun dough (or if for common buns, bread dough), roll it out in a sheet, break some firm butter in small pieces and place over it, roll it out as you would paste; after you have given it two or three turns, moisten the surface of the dough, and strew over it some moist sugar; roll up the sheet into a roll, and cut it in slices; or cut the dough in strips of the required size and turn them round; place on buttered tins having edges, half-an-inch from each. Prove them well, and bake in a moderate oven. They may be dusted with loaf sugar either before or after they are baked. The quantity of ingredients used must be regulated by the required richness of the buns. ½ lb. of butter, ½ lb. of sugar, with 4 lb. of dough, will make a good bun. When bun dough is used, half the quantity of sugar will be sufficient; some omit it altogether.

22.—Balmoral Cakes.

3½ lbs. of flour, 1 lb. of butter, 1 lb. of sugar, 5 eggs, nearly 1 quart of milk, a few caraway seeds, with 1½ oz. of carbonate of soda and tartaric acid, mixed in proportion of 1 oz. of soda to ¾ oz. of acid.

Mix the soda and acid well with the flour, then rub in the butter and sugar; make a bay with the flour, add the seeds, beat up the eggs with the milk, and make all into a dough. Put into buttered pans according to the size; dust with castor sugar, and bake in a moderate oven.

23.—Balloon or Prussian Cakes.

Take currant bun dough and make it into a round flat cake of any required size, and place it on a buttered tin. When it is about half proved, divide it with a long, flat piece of wood having a thin graduated edge, into eight equal parts, and place it again to prove. When it is proved enough, brush over the top lightly with the white of an egg well whisked, dust it with fine powdered sugar and sprinkle it with water, just sufficient to moisten the sugar. Bake it in a rather cool oven to prevent the icing getting too much coloured.

24.—Saffron Buns.

Take the same mixture as for tea cakes, add 1 oz. of caraway seeds, and colour it with saffron. Mould them round, and put them on the tins so as not to touch. When they are near proof, wash the tops with egg and milk, and dust them with castor sugar. Put them in the oven to finish proving, and bake them in a moderately hot oven.

25.—Cinnamon Buns.

Made same way as saffron buns, but leaving out the caraway seeds and saffron, and using instead sufficient ground cinnamon to flavour them.

26.—Jubilee Buns.

2 lbs. of flour, ¾ lb. of butter, ¾ lb. of sugar, 4 eggs, ½ oz. of voil.

Rub the butter in with the flour, make a bay and add the sugar, pound the salt in a little milk and pour it in, break the eggs, and mix all together into a dough. Make six buns out of 1 lb. of dough, mould them round, wash the top with eggs, put some currants on the top, and dust with sugar.

27.—German Buns.

4 lbs. of flour, 2 ozs. of tartar, 1 oz. of carbonate of soda, 12 ozs. of butter, 1½ lbs. of sugar, 4 eggs, 10 drops of essence of lemon, with milk.

Mix tartar and carbonate of soda with the flour, make a sprint or bay, put butter and sugar in bay, cream; add eggs, then milk, make all into a dough, and size them off on buttered tins one inch apart. Wash over with egg, and put a little sugar on top, and bake in a moderate oven.

28.—Common German Buns (for wholesale purposes).

4 lbs. of flour, 2 ozs. of tartar, 1 oz. of carbonate of soda, ½ lb. of lard, 1½ lb. of moist sugar, a little turmeric and churned milk; then proceed as for best German buns. Bake in a sharp oven.

29.—London Buns.

Take 1 pint of milk warmed in a basin, add 2 ozs. of yeast, 8 ozs. of moist sugar, and make a dough with sufficient flour. When the sponge is ready add 12 ozs. of butter, a pinch of salt, and have ready 4 ozs. of chopped peel. Mix all in the dough with 2 eggs and lemon, and prove. When about half proved wash over with yolk of egg. Put sugar on top when full proved.

30.—Penny Queen Cakes.

1½ lb. of butter, 2 lbs. of sugar, 15 eggs, 2 lbs. of flour, 1 lb. of patent flour. Cream butter and sugar in a basin, add eggs, then flour, and as much milk as will make a nice batter. Bake in fluted pans.

31.—Patent Flour.

Take 4 ozs. of tartar, and 2 ozs. of carbonate of soda, and 8 lbs. of flour, and sift through a sieve three times.

32.—Penny Rice Cakes.

4 lbs. of flour, 2½ lbs. of castor sugar, 1½ lb. of butter, 10 eggs, 1 oz. of tartar, ¾ oz. of carbonate of soda, ½ lb. of ground rice, milk to dough. Cream butter and sugar together, add eggs; when well creamed, add flour, rice, and milk. Bake in small round hoops papered round the side.

33.—Cocoanut Cakes.

These are made in the same way, with the same mixture, but leaving out the rice and adding the same quantity of cocoanut. Dust cocoanut on the top of each.

34.—Albert Cakes.

Cream 12 oz. of butter with 1 lb. of sugar, add 13 eggs; mix ½ oz. of carbonate of soda and ¼ oz. of acid with 2 lbs. of flour; weigh 8 ozs. of currants. Mix all together with milk, and bake in a small edged pan. Cut into squares when cold.

IV. GINGERBREAD, PARKINGS, SHORTBREAD, ETC.

35.—Queen’s Gingerbread.

Take 2 lbs. of honey, 1¾ lb. of best moist sugar, and 3 lbs. of flour, ½ lb. of sweet almonds blanched, and ½ lb. of preserved orange peel cut into thin fillets, the yellow rinds of two lemons grated off, 1 oz. of cinnamon, ½ oz. of cloves, mace, and cardamoms mixed and powdered.

Put the honey in a pan over the fire with a wineglassful of water, and make it quite hot; mix the other ingredients and the flour together, make a bay, pour in the honey, and mix all well together. Let it stand till next day, make it into cakes, and bake it. Rub a little clarified sugar until it will blow in bubbles through a skimmer, and with a paste-brush rub over the gingerbread when baked.

36.—German Gingerbread.

Same as Queen’s Gingerbread, but dust tins with flour instead of grease.

37.—Spiced Gingerbread.

Take 3 lbs. of flour, 1 lb. of butter, 1 lb. of moist sugar, 4 ozs. of candied lemon or orange peel cut small, 1 oz. of powdered ginger, 2 ozs. of powdered allspice, ½ oz. of powdered cinnamon, 1 oz. of caraway seeds, and 3 lbs. of treacle.

Rub the butter into the flour, then add the other ingredients, and mix in the dough with the treacle. Make it into nuts or cakes, and bake in a cool oven.

38.—Scarborough Gingerbread (for wholesale purposes).

Take 180 lb. of treacle, 4 lbs. of lard, 4 lbs. 10 ozs. of carbonate of soda, 2 lbs. 11 ozs. of caraway seeds, 2 lbs. 11 ozs. of ginger, and ½ a gallon of water to dissolve the soda. Mix all together with a sufficient quantity of flour.

This should turn out about 390 lbs. of very good gingerbread. Wash with glue and water which has been boiled.

The taste for gingerbread is very widespread, large quantities of the best quality being exported to India. Holland is regarded as carrying off the palm for making good gingerbread. Shakespeare makes mention of it in Love’s Labour’s Lost, where he says, “An I had but one penny in the world thou should’st have it to buy gingerbread.”

39.—Ginger Cakes.

2¼ lbs. of flour, ½ lb. of butter, 1 lb. moist sugar, 2 ozs. of ginger. Rub the butter in with the flour and make the whole into a paste with prepared treacle. Make them into round flat cakes, wash the top with milk, lay a slice of peel on each, and bake in a cool oven.

40.—Prepared Treacle.

Take 4 lbs. of treacle, 1 oz. of alum, 2 ozs. of pearlash, and mix.

41.—Prepared Treacle for Thick Gingerbread.

Take 7 lbs. of treacle, 3 ozs. of potash, 1 oz. volatile salt, and 2 ozs. of alum. The colour of the gingerbread when baked will be according to the quality of the treacle used. Golden syrup makes the lightest coloured and best.

42.—Laughing or Fun Nuts.

1 lb. of gingerbread dough, 3 ozs. of butter, 3 ozs. of sugar, 1 oz. of cayenne pepper. Mix all together, pin out in a sheet, one-eighth of an inch thick. Cut them out the size of a penny. They are very hot.

43.—Grantham or White Gingerbread.

4 lbs. of flour, 2½ lbs. of loaf sugar, 4 ozs. of butter, 1 oz. of volatile salt, 1 pint of milk, ½ oz. of ginger, ¼ oz. of ground cinnamon, nutmeg, and mace, ½ oz. caraway seeds.

44.—Spice Nuts.

3 lbs. of flour, 1 lb. of butter, 1 lb. of moist sugar, 4 ozs. of candied peel cut small, 1 oz. ginger, 2 ozs. allspice, ¼ oz. of cinnamon, 1 oz. caraway seeds, 3 lbs. prepared treacle. Mix same as other doughs.

45. Another Way.—Take 3 lbs. of flour, 2 lbs. of sugar, 2 lbs. of treacle, 2 ozs. of ginger, ¼ oz. of carbonate of soda, 2 drs. of tartaric acid. Mix the day before baking.

46. Another Way.—7 lbs. of flour, 5 lbs. of syrup, 2¾ lbs. of moist sugar, 1 lb. of lard, 4 ozs. ginger, ½ oz. of tartaric acid, ½ oz. of carbonate of soda, ½ oz. of cinnamon, ½ oz. of mace. Mix and work same as other doughs. This is a capital mixture.

47.—Light Gingerbread.

Dr. Colquhoun gives a recipe for preparing a light gingerbread as follows: Take 1 lb. of flour, ¼ oz. of carbonate of magnesia, and 1/8 oz. of tartaric acid. Mix the flour and magnesia thoroughly, then dissolve and add the acid; take the usual quantity of butter, treacle, and spice; melt the butter and pour it with the treacle and acid into the flour and magnesia. The whole must then be made into a dough by kneading, and set aside for a period varying from half an hour to an hour; it will then be ready for the oven, and should not on any account be kept longer than two or three hours before being baked. When taken from the oven it will prove a light, pleasant, and spongy bread, having no injurious ingredients in it. That made with potash, says Dr. Colquhoun, gives the bread a disagreeable alkaline flavour, unless disguised with some aromatic ingredient, and is likely to prove injurious to delicate persons.

48.—Italian Jumbles, or Brandy Snaps.

6 lbs. of flour, 7 lbs. of good rich sugar, 1¼ lb. of butter or lard, 2 ozs. of ginger or mixed spice, 6 lbs. of raw syrup. Make the whole into a moderately stiff paste or dough, roll out into sheets fully an eighth of an inch thick, cut them with a plain round cutter of 3 inches diameter, put them on tins well greased, and bake in a moderate oven. When baked cut them from the tin and lay them on the peel-shaft till they are hard. If they should get too cold to turn, put them in the oven to warm. Brandy snaps are the same as above, without being turned.

Note.—For cakes, spice nuts, or biscuits of a small size, that require washing on top, use a piece of linen the size of the tin, dip it in water, squeeze it, and spread it on top of the snaps or biscuits and gently press your hand over it. This will prevent them from running together on the tins.

49.—Halfpenny Gingerbread Squares.

8 lbs. of flour, 4 lbs. of treacle, 3 ozs. of pearlash, 3 ozs. of alum, and 1 oz. of carbonate of soda. Make a bay, put in the treacle, add the soda, dissolve the pearlash in 1 gill of cold water and pour it on the treacle; put another gill of water in a small pan, add the alum, and let it boil till it is dissolved; then pour it on the other ingredients. Mix all together, put into two tins about 24 inches by 18 inches with an edge 1 inch high. Cut out of each tin 2s. 3½d. worth. This mixture is for wholesale purposes, and pays well.

Note.—Nearly all mixtures made in this way are best made the day before.

50.—Hunting Nuts.

7 lbs. of flour, 3½ lbs. of treacle, 1 lb. of sugar, 1 lb. of butter, 3 ozs. of pearlash, 3 ozs. of alum, half a teaspoonful of essence of lemon, 1 lb. of lemon peel cut small. Mix as above; roll out the dough in strips, and with the fingers break off pieces the size of a small marble, lay on the tins in rows and bake in a moderate oven on tins slightly buttered.

51.—Parkings.

3½ lbs. of oatmeal, 1 lb. of flour, 1 lb. of butter, 8 ozs. of moist sugar, ½ oz. of baking powder, with sufficient syrup to make all into a moderately stiff dough; weigh off at 4 ozs. for a penny, mould up round, and place on tins 2½ inches apart. Bake in a cool oven.

52. Another Way.—6 lbs. of snap dough, 12 ozs. of moist sugar, 10 ozs. of butter, 1¾ lb. of oatmeal, 1½ oz. of carbonate of soda, 1 oz. of caraway seeds, 1 oz. of seasoning. Proceed as above.

53.—Parking Cake.

3 lbs. of oatmeal, 1 lb. of flour, 4 lbs. of treacle, 1 lb. of good butter, 2 teaspoonfuls of carbonate of soda, 1 gill of beer. Mixed up as above. Baked in an edged pan 3 inches high, in a cool oven.

54.—Scotch Shortbread.

Take 1 lb. of butter, 2 lbs. of flour, 8 ozs. of powdered sugar. Mix the sugar in the butter, then take in all the flour and thoroughly mix and rub all together till of a nice mellow colour and easy to work; weigh off the size required, and shape into square or round pieces; dock them on the top, notch them round the sides, put on clean dry tins, and bake in a moderate oven.

55.—English Shortbread.

1 lb. of flour, ½ lb. of sugar, ½ lb. butter, 2 eggs. Mix as for Scotch Shortbread, ornament the tops with designs of neatly-cut lemon peel and caraway comfits.

56.—French Shortbread.

2 lbs. of flour, ¾ lb. of butter, ¾ lb. of sugar, 4 eggs, ½ oz. of ammonia. Rub the butter in the flour, make a bay, put in the eggs, sugar, and ammonia; beat them well with your hand, then draw in the flour and butter; make all into a dough, weigh at 12 ozs., chaff them up round, pin out a good breadth, mark them off into eight, place a piece of peel on each, and bake in good oven. Cut the marked pieces with a sharp knife after they are baked.

V. HARD BISCUITS.

57.—Machine-made Biscuits.

In making the dough for hard biscuits it should be kept in a loose crumbly state until the whole is of an equal consistency, then work, rub, or press it together with your hands until the whole is collected or formed into a mass. If the old-fashioned biscuit brake is replaced by a biscuit machine so much the better for the baker and the goods he turns out. If so, then all that is necessary will be to properly adjust the rollers whether for braking (that is making the dough) or rolling out for the cutter. If an amateur tries to make biscuits he will always experience some difficulty in moulding them if they are hand-made. When this is so it would be better to cut them out with a cutter.

58.—Ship Biscuits.

These were evidently the first biscuits, from which have sprung all the varieties of hard biscuits which we at present possess. They are of the same character as those which were first made by man in his progress towards civilisation, and were baked or roasted on hot embers. Before this, men knew of no other use for their meal than to make it into a kind of porridge. Biscuits prepared in a simple fashion were for centuries the food of the Roman soldiers. The name is derived from the Latin bis, twice, and the French cuit = coctus, meaning twice baked or cooked.

Ship biscuits are composed of flour and water only; but some think a small proportion of yeast makes a great improvement in them. The method adopted is to make a small weak sponge as for bread previous to making the dough; the necessary quantity of water is then added. The flour used for the commoner sort of these biscuits is known as middlings or fine sharps; and those made from the finer or best are called captains or cabin biscuits. A sack of flour loses, by drying and baking, 28 lbs.

59.—Captains’ Biscuits.

7 lbs. of fine flour, 6 ozs. of butter, 1 quart of water or milk. Rub the butter in with the flour until it is crumbled into very small pieces, make a bay in the centre of the flour, pour in the water or milk, make it into a dough, and break it when made into dough, chaff or mould up the required size, 4 or 5 ozs. each, pin out with a rolling pin about 5 inches in diameter, dock them and lay them with their faces together. When they are ready bake them in a moderately quick oven, of a nice brown colour. These are seldom made with hand, as the machinery in use outstrips hand-made biscuits of this class in speed and gives a better appearance and quality.

60.—Thick Captains.

7½ lbs. of flour, ½ lb. of butter, 1 quart of water or milk. Mix as directed. When ready weigh out at 2 ozs. each, mould or chaff, roll out, dock quite through and bake in a hot oven. All biscuits of this class require thorough drying in the drying room.

61.—Abernethy Biscuits.

(Dr. Abernethy’s Original Recipe.)

1 quart of milk, 6 eggs, 8 ozs. of sugar, ½ oz. of caraway seeds, with flour sufficient to make the whole of the required consistency. They are generally weighed off at 2 ozs. each, moulded up, pinned and docked, and baked in a moderate oven.

Note.—The heat of an oven is not required so strong for biscuits containing sugar, as it causes them to take more colour in less time.

62.—Abernethys as made in London.

7 lbs. of flour, 8 ozs. of sugar, 8 ozs. of butter, 4 eggs, 1½ pint of milk, 2 tablespoonfuls of orange-flower water, ½ oz. of caraway seeds.

63.—Usual Way of making Abernethy Biscuits.

Take 8 lbs. of flour, 1½ lb. of butter and lard, 12 ozs. of sugar, ½ oz. of caraway seeds; some use about ½ oz. of powdered volatile salts. Proceed to make into dough as before. Well break the dough and finish with either hand or machine.

64.—Wine Biscuits.

Take 8 lbs. of flour, rub in 2 lbs. of good butter. Make a bay, add about 1 quart of water, take in your flour and butter and well shake up, and note the more your mixture is shaken up and worked the better biscuits you will have. Also note in shaking up these biscuits, when they are mixed let your two thumbs meet, giving the mixture a shake up in the air till you have all the dry flour worked in and the mixture is nice and moist. Bake in a smart oven on wires.

65.—Soda Biscuits.

14 lbs. of flour, 1¼ lb. of butter, ½ oz. of carbonate of soda, 3 drachms of muriatic acid, 2 quarts of water. Mix as the last, adding the acid mixed with half-a-pint of the water after the dough is shaken up, then finish with the machine.

66.—Boston Lemon Crackers.

26 lbs. of flour, 2¼ lbs. of butter, 5 lbs. of sugar, 2 ozs. of ammonia, ½ oz. of essence of lemon, 3 quarts of water. This should be made into small round biscuits rather larger than pic-nics. Bake them in a sound oven.

67.—Pic-Nics.

30 lbs. of flour, 4 lbs. of butter, 4 lbs. of castor sugar, 3 ozs. of carbonate of soda, 2 ozs. of muriatic acid, 4 quarts of milk.

68.—Common Pic-Nics.

28 lbs. of flour, 2 lbs. of lard, 2 lbs. of sugar, 2 ozs. of carbonate of soda, 2 ozs. of hydrochloric acid. Mix as above and finish the dough in the usual way. Bake in a moderately brisk oven.

69.—Luncheon Biscuits.

56 lbs. of flour, 3½ lbs. of lard, 3½ lbs. of butter, 1¼ lb. of castor sugar, 4 quarts of milk, 4 quarts of water, 2 ozs. of carbonate of soda, 1½ oz. of hydrochloric acid. Mix as before described. Let the dough be of a good stiffness and broken very clear. The cutters may be either round or oval. They require about 20 minutes’ baking. As soon as they are drawing put them in the stove for about two hours.

70.—Digestive Biscuits.

Take equal parts of fine flour and wheat-meal flour and mix them together to 5 quarts of milk and water. Use 2½ lbs. of butter and 2 ozs. of German yeast. Rub the butter in the flour, make a bay, pour in your liquor and yeast. Mix the whole into a dough, break it a little, and put it in a warm place to prove. After it is light enough, break it quite smooth and clear, roll it out in a sheet one-eighth of an inch in thickness and cut out your biscuits. As soon as the biscuits are cut out bake in a hot oven.

71. Another way.—5 lbs. of granulated wheat meal, 1 lb. of butter, ¼ lb. of sugar, ¼ lb. of ground arrowroot, 4 eggs, 1 quart of milk, ¼ oz. of carbonate of soda. These are mixed up in the usual way, pinned out and cut with a small round cutter, docked and baked in a moderate oven.

72.—Small Arrowroot Biscuits.

5½ lbs. of flour, 8 ozs. of butter, 6 ozs. of sugar, 6 ozs. of arrowroot, 3 eggs, 1 pint of liquor. Prepare as the last. Make 16 biscuits from 1 lb. of dough. Mould and pin into round cakes 3 inches in diameter, dock them with an arrowroot docker, and bake them in a sound oven.

73.—Coffee Biscuits.

4 lbs. of flour, 4 ozs. of butter, 4 ozs. of castor sugar, 5 large eggs, with enough water to fill a pint. Make a bay; after the butter is rubbed in with the flour, add the sugar and beat up the eggs and water together; pour into your bay, make the whole into a dough, break it clear and make it quite thin. When you finish it roll it out the tenth of an inch in thickness, cut with your coffee biscuit cutter and bake them in a brisk oven. If the oven should not be hot enough to raise them round the edges twist up a handful of shavings rather hard and place them round the edges of the biscuits when baking.

74.—Victoria Biscuits.

3½ lbs. of flour, 2 ozs. butter, 2 ozs. of sugar, 1 pint of eggs. Make a bay, rub the butter in the flour before you make a bay, add the sugar, pour in the eggs, beat them well up with your hands, make the whole into a dough, break well that it may be clear, roll into thin sheets, cut with an oval cutter the same as used for Brightons, put them on clean tins, and bake in a hot oven the same as Coffee Biscuits.

75.—Shell Biscuits.

5 lbs. of flour, 12 ozs. of castor sugar, 12 ozs. of butter, 1 pint of milk. Make all into a good dough, roll into sheets half-an-inch thick, cut with an oval-pointed cutter in shape thus

, place them on a crimp board and with a knife or scraper curl them up, put on clean dry tins. Bake in moderate heat.

76.—York Biscuits.

5¼ lbs. of flour, 12 ozs. of butter, 2 lbs. of sugar, 1 pint of milk. Mix as before into a dough, roll out the dough ¼ of an inch thick, cut them into long strips, and cut them diamond shape or square, dock them either on the table or crimping-board as your fancy dictates. Bake them in a rather warm oven.

77.—Machine Biscuits.

10 lbs. of flour, 2¼ lbs. of butter, 10 ozs. of castor sugar, 1 quart of water. Mix up the same as the others, roll out a sheet ½ inch in thickness, cut them out in various forms, dock them, and bake on clean dry tins in a moderate oven.

78.—Bath Oliver Biscuits.

1 quart of milk, 1 lb. of butter, 2 ozs. of German yeast, 6½ lbs. of flour. Make the milk warm, add the sugar, yeast and a handful of flour to form a ferment, let it ferment for an hour and a half. Rub the butter into the remaining flour and make all into a nice smooth dough; let it stand about two hours, then roll it out thin; cut the biscuits out with a cutter about three inches in diameter, dock them well, place on clean tins sprinkled with water, wash over with milk when you have them all off, put them in a steam press or drawers for half an hour, and bake in a cool oven.

79.—Edinburgh Biscuits.

4 lbs. of flour, 12 ozs. of butter, 6 ozs of sugar, 1 pint of milk. Mix up in the usual way, break smooth, and make 12 biscuits out of a pound of dough; roll thin, dock them, and bake in a brisk oven. Sold at a halfpenny each.

80.—Nursery Biscuits.

Take 1 quart of milk, 5 ozs. sugar, 3 ozs. yeast, ¼ lb. of flour. Mix all together into a ferment and let it drop, add ¼ lb. arrowroot, 5 ozs. butter, and as much flour as will make a good dough. Put it away till you think it is ripe enough to work off, which you will know by its appearing light and spongy. When it has reached this stage take 4 lbs. of the dough and roll it out ½ inch thick, cut out with a plain round cutter an inch and a half in diameter, put them on tins a quarter of an inch apart, prove them in steam press, and when ready bake in a sound oven. Put them in a drying stove or some warm place to thoroughly dry them, to make them light and easily digestible.

81.—Soda Biscuits.

12½ lbs. of flour, 1 oz. of salt, 6 ozs. of lard, 1 oz. of acid, 1½ oz. of soda, 2 quarts of water. Mix as for Machine Biscuits, break the dough smooth and clear, let it lay for about half an hour, then roll out in large sheets nearly the thickness of three penny pieces, cut out with an oval spring cutter five inches in length and three inches in breadth. The dough must be well made and of a good stiffness. When cut out lay them on top of each other in sixes on carrying boards. Have the oven of a good sound heat and well cleaned out, have a running peel that will hold six biscuits, and run them on the sole of the oven.