FINE ALMOND CAKE.
Blanch, dry, and pound to the finest possible paste, eight ounces of fresh Jordan almonds, and one ounce of bitter; moisten them with a few drops of cold water or white of egg, to prevent their oiling; then mix with them very gradually twelve fresh eggs which have been whisked until they are exceedingly light; throw in by degrees one pound of fine, dry, sifted sugar, and keep the mixture light by constant beating, with a large wooden spoon, as the separate ingredients are added. Mix in by degrees three-quarters of a pound of dried and sifted flour of the best quality; then pour gently from the sediment a pound of butter which has been just melted, but not allowed to become hot, and beat it very gradually, but very thoroughly, into the cake, letting one portion entirely disappear before another is thrown in; add the rasped or finely-grated rinds of two sound fresh lemons, fill a thickly-buttered mould rather more than half full with the mixture, and bake the cake from an hour and a half to two hours in a well-heated oven. Lay paper over the top when it is sufficiently coloured, and guard carefully against its being burned.
546Jordan almonds, 1/2 lb.; bitter almonds, 1 oz.; eggs, 12; sugar, 1 lb.; flour, 3/4 lb.; butter, 1 lb.; rinds lemons, 2: 1-1/2 to 2 hours.
Obs.—Three-quarters of a pound of almonds may be mixed with this cake when so large a portion of them is liked, but an additional ounce or two of sugar, and one egg or more, will then be required.