Biscuits

158. - Use recipe for Baking Powder Biscuits. Combine ingredients in the following manner: a. Dry ingredients, shortening chopped in, liquid. Mix with a knife just enough to combine the ingredients. Turn the dough on a slightly floured board and roll it out, cut (see Expt. 159), and bake.

b. Dry ingredients, liquid, melted shortening stirred into mixture with a spoon. Turn it on a slightly floured board, roll, cut out (see Expt. 159), and bake.

159. - Divide biscuits cut out in Expt. 158 into three parts, a1, 02, a3; 61, 62, 63. Brush a1 and b1 with a little milk before baking. Brush a2 and b1 with a little melted butter before baking. Bake a3 and b3 as cut out. Compare results.

160. - Use recipe for Baking Powder Biscuits. Substitute for butter the following shortenings: a. 1/2 butter, 1/2 lard b. oleomargarine c. lard d. crisco e. beef drippings f. chicken fat g. olive oil h. cottonseed oil i. corn oil j. peanut oil

Compare the results as to appearance, flavor, texture.

161. - Compute the cost of the products of Expt. 160 and compare with the rating as to quality.

Pastry

162. - Use recipe for plain paste. Combine ingredients in the following manner: a. Dry ingredients, shortening chopped in, ice water. Chill before rolling out.

b. Dry ingredients and ice water made into a dough. Roll mixture on a pastry cloth. Fold and roll the shortening in.

c. Dry ingredients and melted shortening mixed as much as possible. Chill, chop mixture into uncombined flour. Add ice water.

Note : An interesting observation can be made from the following experiment: Dry ingredients, measured and melted shortening, versus dry ingredients, melted and measured shortening.

163. - From the results of Expt. 162 decide upon the best method of combining ingredients and bake the following pies in this manner:

Pastry shell : a. dredge with flour - apple pie.

b. brush over with white of egg - custard pie.

c. bake before filling - cream pie.

Sum up your observations concerning shortenings used in pastry, methods of combining, and baking of pies.

Cake

164. - Note that the general rule for plain cake conforms to these proportions:

1/4 as much shortening as sugar.

1/3 as much liquid as flour.

2 tsp. of baking powder to each cup of flour, but for every egg after the first, 1/2 tsp. of baking powder is deducted.

Combine the ingredients for plain cake in the following ways. Bake the products at the same temperature : a. Cream the butter, add sugar, whole eggs unbeaten, milk, sifted dry ingredients.

b. Cream the butter, add unbeaten egg yolk, sugar, milk, sifted dry ingredients, beaten egg white.

c. Egg yolk, sugar, milk, sifted dry ingredients, melted butter, beaten egg white.

d. Cream the butter, add sugar, beaten egg yolk, milk and dry ingredients alternately, beaten egg whites.

165. - Repeat Expt. 164, substituting for butter the following: a. 1/2 butter, 1/2 crisco b. 1/2 butter, 1/2 lard c. oleomargarine d. crisco e. cottonseed oil f. corn oil g. chicken fat

166. - a. Use the rule for plain cake, and prepare three cakes, using for shortening, butter, oleo, crisco.

b. Divide each rule into 5 parts A, B, C, D, E. Bake A in a slow oven; record temperature. Bake B in a moderate oven; record temperature. Bake C in a slow oven, increasing the temperature; record stages and changes in temperature.

Bake D in a hot oven, reducing the temperature; record temperatures and changes at each stage. Bake E in a cold oven, that is, light the burners when the cake is placed in the oven. Summarize results.

Record the optimum method of combination of ingredients and oven temperature for each fat used in cake baking.

167. - a. Add chocolate to plain cake recipe. Determine the amount necessary. What change in the amount of flour is necessary ?

Why?

b. Add nuts to plain cake recipe. Compare with plain cake. What change in the recipe is necessary? Why?

168. - a. Cake without butter: compare the recipe for butter cake with that for sponge cake. Note the absence of butter in the latter and also the greater number of eggs. Review the experiments with eggs and recall the effect of various temperatures in the cooking of eggs. Review the oven temperatures given by Miss Van Arsdale in Some Attempts to Standardize Oven Temperatures, and compare with those determined in preceding experiments with butter cake. Select the range in each instance which corresponds to "slow" and "moderate." Prepare one rule of sponge cake (use first recipe) and bake samples at those temperatures. Compare as to moisture, texture, and length of cooking.

b. Repeat the above experiment, using any sponge cake recipe calling for a large number of eggs. In what way do the results differ from those in the preceding one? How do you account for these differences?

c. Repeat, using the first recipe for white sponge cake or angel cake. Compare the results with those in a and b. Account for the differences noted. What is a satisfactory range in oven temperatures for each type of cake?

d. Having determined the oven temperature in the above experiments, prepare three sponge cakes, combining the ingredients in the following manner:

Beat yolks with Dover egg beater. Add the sugar.

Fold in the whites before the flour. Fold in the whites after the flour. Stir in the whites after the flour.

Bake and compare as to texture. Which method seems most satisfactory?

Note : This experiment can be successfully carried out if arranged so that samples of a, b, and c are baked together at the various temperatures. Comparison is thus made easy.

Leavens - Leavening Agents

A leaven or leavening agent is something which will lighten a mixture. Flour mixtures are usually leavened by steam, by evolution of carbon dioxide, or by the expansion of inclosed and heated air. White of egg or cream may be said to be "leavened" when "whipped," in which case the leavening consists simply in the mechanical incorporation of air bubbles. In some bakeries (especially in England) dough is leavened by incorporating air under pressure, which when the pressure is released will expand even without application of heat.

When leavening is to be accomplished by means of carbon dioxide the latter is usually produced either:

(1) by yeast fermentation, producing carbon dioxide from a portion of the carbohydrate of the mixture;

(2) by interaction of sodium bicarbonate ("cooking soda ") with an acid substance (either free acid or acid salt) in the presence of moisture.

Sour milk, buttermilk, vinegar, molasses, and some fruit juices contain free acids.

Many fruit juices contain acid salts.

Acid salts used as such to liberate carbon dioxide from sodium bicarbonate - in other words used as the "acid constituent" of baking powders - are chiefly : (a) acid potassium tartrate (cream of tartar), (b) acid phosphate, (c) some form of alum or aluminum sulphate; hence the classification of baking powders in three main groups - the "tartrate," the "phosphate," and the "alum" powders.