Archive for January, 2016

18th Century recipe – Cake Icing

Posted on: January 1st, 2016 by hauleymusic No Comments

[1747]
”To Ice a great Cake:

Take two Pound double refin’d Sugar, beat and sift it very fine,

and likewise beat and sift a little Starch and mix with it,

then beat six Whites of Eggs to Froth, and put to it some Gum-Water, the Gum must be steep’d in Orange-flower-water,

then mix and beat all these together two Hours, and put it on your Cake;

when it is baked, set it in the Oven again to harden a quarter of an Hour, take great Care it is not discolour’d.

When it is drawn, ice it over the Top and Sides,

take two Pound of double refin’d Sugar beat and sifted, and the Whites of three Eggs beat to a Froth, with three or four Spoonfuls of Orange-flower-water, and three Grains of Musk and Ambergrease together;

put all these in a Stone Mortar, and beat these till it is a white as Snow, and with a Brush or Bundle of Feathers, spread it all over the Cake,

Then put it in the Oven to dry; but take Care the Oven does not discolour it.

When it is cold paper it, and it will keep good five or six Weeks.”


—The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, Hannah Glasse, London [1747] (p. 138)


[Note…Many colonial women cooked from European cookbooks until the American printing trade began to flourish].