BREAD, CAKES AND BISCUITS
well, put the butter in a dish or basin, place this in an
empty pail, cover it with a piece of muslin to keep out
dust, etc., and lower the pail into the water, being careful
however, that the latter does not reach anywhere near the
top of the pail. In the country abroad all butter is stored
thus in the summer.
All fruit used in cake-making should be of best quality
and carefully picked over, cleansed, and stalked. Currants
should be thoroughly washed, and then slowly dried.
Nothing is more disagreeable than, when eating cake, to
come across currant stalks, or raisin stones. Candied peel
must be sliced very thinly before chopping, or it will be
most indigestible. Almonds are blanched by dropping them,
when shelled, into boiling water in which they are left till
on pressing them between your finger and thumb they will
slip out of the outer skins. (Pistachios are treated in the
same way.) To preserve their whiteness, as you free the
almonds from their skins, drop them into a basin of very
cold water, leave them in this for an hour, then dry them
first in a cloth, and then in the oven, being careful they do
not colour. When almonds have been blanched thus they
may be chopped or shred, and placed in a plate with a few
drops of any colouring to taste, and shaken and rolled in
this till they are evenly coloured all over, then let them
dry, and store in a dry place. Or, if preferred, when
chopped, they may be baked a golden brown, then thickly
dusted with sugar and returned to the oven to set. Need-
less to say, filberts, pistachios, pignole, walnuts, etc., may
all be treated thus.
Lastly, it may interest many amateur cooks to know that,
for small cakes at all events, an oven is not an absolute
necessity. This will seem strange to the average conven-
tional British housewife, but it is a fact nevertheless that,
given an untinned wrought iron pan, with a sheet-iron lid
an inch or two larger in diameter than the pan, a French
woman can, and does, produce even desirable sponge cakes