SIMNEL CAKES.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8315, 13 May 1905, Page 3

SIMNEL CAKES.

How to Mako Tiem.

[Woman.)

-In aom* countie., notably in Shropripe and Lancashire. Simnel cakes* h* Y0 be Sf^! pirt and parcel of family "unionfl,^ inoy are, properly speaking-, peoulxar to r Mid-i*ent or ;"^£t>lhering Sunday,*- but. are also, u«d, rather out of their season, whenever, famines ce'ibrate a home-coming, and gradaully , they hav6 ra-assumed a post of honour from which a decade or two ago they' seemed, -Useiy to he ousted by more modem ceremonies and more fashionable fare. . We. want to arrive at ft ,e*kV °J? a ™ shape (though sometim©* : mada. round) and encased ii a crust coloured with saffron, till it is a deep yellow. It must hav^ amg: border of tCmond ioing, jod b* ricWy ornamented. Formerly it was boiled for many hours, then allowed to cool} ■ *"i^*. 1 7J > brushed over with white of egg ana baKea, but nowadays thia double process; » not de rigueur. Belbw aro given one or two Bimn«l cake recipes. A ; Lancashire Recipe— B«*t to a cream 4'-b butter and Jib sugar. AdS i-b of. currants, 2o» candied peel, shredded, 1 2oz almonds, blanched and cut up; then ■ add ■ iio fibUT and Jib of eggs, weighed in their sheLs beatiag the eggs and adding them last. . £01. four Jioura in a shape, then cover with a flour and water paste, and bake four hours. Ornament with almond icing, deeply tinted with saffron-, and Jwith silver bon-bona, angelica and cherries. . '; „ -. Another Me&od.— Required: Jib fine white sugar, Jib flour, jib butter, one tewmpful of milk, three eggs, 2oz chopped- pandied_pwi two te»spo6nfu.s baking-powder. .beat w butter aod sugar to a cream; beat, andrado 1 the yolks of eggs id a little milk, ■ add thesf to the butter and sugar. Whin the white; pf eggs to a stiff ♦froth, and stir them lieht in. Mir the baking-powder mfh the flour add the candied p«el,. and stir thwe ver li«htiy into the mixture. Bake all" togethe ift a modeTate oven for two hoars.- Border with almond i«ng, decorate^ with pipi»K ftna

bon-bona, and send to table with a white frill or oake band round it. A Delicious Simnel Cake. — Seven ounces of flour, 2oz rice-flour, $ib currants, 2oz mixed peel, five eggs, Jib castor sugar, and a 9 much ground nutmeg, cinnamon and mace as will lie on a threepenny piece, Jib butter. Beat the bulter, sugar and rice-flour iogether for twenty minutes with the hand. Add the eggs, one at a time, and beat we.l for twenty minutes longer. Then add all the dry ingredients and mix light-y. Line a cake-tin with grease-proof paper, put half the mixture in; then have a layer of almond paste (made as below), and fill the tin up with the cak*-mixture ; . When the cake is almost cooked* put almond paste round the edges, top and bottom, crumpling ft up with a fork or pricking it with the angers into a symmetrical series of tiny mounds. Replace in the. oven for a ehort while. Eor the almond paste, mix thoroughly with a wooden spoon, ' Jib of ground almonda J.b, raw sugar, J.b castor sugar, two eggs, and a few drops of almond flavour. A Shropshire Recipe.— Three-quarters of a pound of castor sugar, |lb butter, lib flour, eight eggs, 6oz ground almonds, Jib sultanas, Jib chopped citron peel, J-lb currants, a pinch of mixed spice, tho grated rind and juice of two lemons. Some crystallised fruits and silver dragees. Cream the butter and sugar together, add the eggs separately. Stir in ail the dry ingredients, and ' add th» rind and juice of tha lemons. Bake two hours and a. half in a cool ovori. When cool make a thick ring of almond icing round the top and bottom edges of the cake. Place a border of crystallised and £lace cherriep round this, fastening them on wiih 'a ilitlle saffron-coloured royal icing, and garnish mth tho silver dragees. Make a lattice-work *> of almond icing across ihe top of the . cake, and at its crossings place * cherry, and v let a silver bon-bon be in the centre of . each tiny square. "The side* may be similarly treated, but it is more usual to leave them plain, 6ave for the edging of almond round the bottom.

A Sdmnel Cake made ■with Yeast. — Make a sponge -with Joz of German yeast, mixed with, a teaspoonful of castor sugar and a gill of lukewarm milk, and added to half a pound of flour. Let it rise on© hour; then -work well into it lOoz of currants, 4oz candied -peel, two eggs beaten to a froth, 4oz of fresh butter beaten to a cream, and' a teaspoonful of mixed spice. When all- is mixed, let it rise for another hour; then divide into two portions, put one in a caketin, cover it with a layer one inch thick of almond icing, cover over the rest of the cake and bake three to three and a half hours. When cold, and quite firm, ice with almond and sugar king.