Soups, savouries, sweets, with a chapter on breads

If not, return them to the oven for a short time, leaving the door ajar. These biscuits will keep some weeks if in an air-tight canister. * The weary king was thankful^ the poor matCs loaf he took; He by him sate, and, while he ate, his tears fell in the brook,^ Lockhart's * Spanish Ballads.' * And Beauty won the wavering heatt. By dint of pickle, and of tart. ^ Praed. Wheatmeal Plum Cakes. One pound of wheatmeal, ten ounces of pounded sugar, one pound of butter, one pound of stoned and chopped raisins, two ounces of sweet almonds blanched and chopped, a quarter of a pound of candied lemon-peel and eight eggs. Beat the butter and sugar to a cream, add the eggs, two at a time, whisking all the time to prevent them curdling. When quite smooth and light, which will be in about twenty minutes, scatter the flour in a little at a time, and continue beating until it is all mixed in ; then add the raisins, almonds and peel. Line a ' two-pound ' cake-tin with buttered paper * Certain of the dishes^ and especially the su>eets and fianSf Madam Esmond prepared herself with great neatness ami dexterity^ Thackeray. * First I go and make the patties ^ and the puddings ^ and the jellies * *Bab Ballads.' well above the sides ; pour in the mixture and bake at once in a hot oven. The time required will be from an hour and^a half to an hour and three-quarters, as wheat-meal cakes take longer baking than white flour ones. Test the cake with a wooden skewer to see if it is baked through before removing it from the oven. When done, shake it carefully from the tin, and place it on a sieve to cool. These cakes should not be cut for three or four days after they are made. Sugar Biscuits. Half a pound of fresh butter, one pound of flour, half a pound of pounded sugar, the grated rind of a large lemon. * A pye which' still retains its proper name. Though common grown^ yet, 'with white sugar strovfd And buttered right, its goodness is allowed,^ 'King's Art of Cookery.* 193 O ' And here each season do those cakes abide^ Whose honoured names tJie inventive city oivn, tendering through Britain^ s Isle Salopians praises known.* Shenstone. Beat the butter and sugar to a cream, add the flour by degrees, and lastly the lemonpeel ; when thoroughly mixed, roll out the dough very thin. Stamp out the biscuits with a round fluted cutter, and bake in a moderate oven for twenty minutes. Wheatmeal Shrewsbury Cakes. Half a pound of butter, one pound of wheatmeal, six ounces of pounded sugar, the grated rind of a lemon, two whole eggs. Beat the butter and sugar to a cream, add the wheat-meal by degrees, and the eggs one at a time. When thoroughly mixed, put in a cool place for two hours to set. Roll it out thin, cut into biscuits, and bake for twenty minutes. ' / will dance and eat plums at your wedding,* * Merry Wives of Windsor.* * And see ! what a mountainous bride-cake ! — a thing By itself— with small pieces to pass through a ringP Ingoldsby. One pound of pounded sugar, three-quarters of a pound of well-dried flour, the grated rind of a lemon, seven eggs, leaving unused the whites of two. Boil the sugar in a teacupful of water, and pour it on to the eggs, stirring briskly all the time. Whisk this for twenty minutes, or until it becomes quite stiff. Then add the flour gradually ; bake in a buttered tin in a moderate oven. Test if cooked by a wooden skewer. Icing of Twelfth Cake. One pound and a half of butter, one pound of sifted loaf-sugar, one pound and a half of * ** Mind and send me a large piece of cake^^ I go up and whisper archly to old Mr, Ward' — Thackeray. O 2 * *MasSi thou lovest plums well.* * 2 Henry VI.'