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SHORTCAKE
MAKING SHORTCAKE IN CAMP (1876)

National Cookery Book (1876)

A Michigan Receipt for MAKING SHORTCAKE IN CAMP

Take the top of your provision box, or one of the boards from the bottom of your boat (camp supposed to be on the shores of Lake Superior). As it will probably be rough, cover it with a napkin, then you have a good pasteboard. Get your Indian guide to find a smooth sapling, peel off the bark, scrape it smooth, and then you have your rolling-pin. Mix half a pound of butter in half a pound of flour; but as you have probably left your scales at home, measure three or four tablespoonfuls of butter and one quart of flour; add a small spoonful of salt. Wet it with the coldest water you can get, roll it out about one-third of an inch thick, and of a shape suitable to your cooking utensil. If you are so luxurious as to have a campstove or baker, you can cut the paste into cakes and bake them as you would in civilized life; but if you take things after the manner of the aborigines, you will pour the grease from the frying-pan in which the salt pork has been cooked, and put the sheet of paste into it, cooking it over some coals drawn from the fire. There is still another way. If you can find a smooth, flat stone, heat it thoroughly in the fire; then withdraw it, and having dusted it with flour, bake your cake upon it. Eaten with a good mug of tea, a thin slice of pork, brown and crisp, and a broiled trout, all seasoned with good appetite, nothing can be more delicious.