All About Home Baking

In another “I’ll give your ephemera back after I’ve used it” moment, I snagged This 1935 edition of General Foods seminal baking book, All About Home Baking from Greg.

It’s an excellent primer on the fundamentals of baking from scratch. 23 Easy Picture Lessons promise to cover the keys to baking success. And they really do, not only through the recipes, but in the hints illustrated in Key Steps picture lessons.

Tod’s promised to scan the book for me, so that I can return it to Greg for artistic repurposing. When I have the scans I will post them. But until then, I want to share some of the useful knowledge this book imparts.

Butter is generally preferred for greasing because of the good flavor it imparts to the crust. Melt the butter in a cup over hot water and use only the oil on top. Do not use the salt that sinks to the bottom, as salt tends to make the baked product stick to the pan.

I never knew that. I guess that greasing the pan with solid butter will make the cake stick because of the salt. Here’s another tidbit.

Divide the baking time into quarters. It will help you controlling your oven heat if you know just when you ought to look at your cake and what you may expect to see. For that purpose, baking time for cake has been divided into quarters as follows:

1st quarter - Cake mixture begins to rise.
2nd quarter - Rising continues; surface begins to brown
3rd quarter - Finished rising; cntinues to brown
4th quarter - Finished baking; shrinks from sides of pan

Take a look at your cake at the end of each quarter and, if you find that it is not baking according to this schedule, adjust the heat.

This was written in a time when ovens didn’t always have thermometers or good heat regulation. Here’s a practical test suggested for checking your oven’s temperature:

Set a pan sprinkled with flour in the oven and if the flour becomes a delicate brown in five minutes, the oven is slow (250 F to 350 F). If the flour turns a medium golden brown in five minutes, the oven is moderate (350 F to 400 F). If the flour turns a deep, dark brown in five minutes, the oven is hot (400 F to 450 F). If the flour turns a deep dark brown in three minutes, the oven is very hot (450 F to 500 F). These same tests may also be done with white tissue paper or white unglazed paper.

Posted by kuri at July 26, 2007 11:10 AM