Bread and cake baking:

Description

Frederick D. Hauptmann's manual gathers the working knowledge of a nineteenth-century bake shop: choosing flour, keeping stock yeast and ferments, setting sponge, handling dough, and managing an oven. From there it moves through wheat, rye, French and Graham breads, twists, buns, rolls, rusks, doughnuts and cinnamon cake, then into long chapters on pound, sponge, fruit and lady cakes, jumbles, ginger varieties, cream puffs, jelly rolls and macaroon pyramids, with detailed notes on icings and ornament. Puff paste, tarts and pie fillings follow, along with a section of simpler household baking.

The closing pages turn to ice cream, covering freezing technique and care of equipment, plus water ices, jellies, candies, colourings and table decoration. Together they show a trade where bread and confectionery were one craft, measured by hand and judged by feel.