Ingredients
- two whites of eggs to \ pint of water
Directions
Tarts or puffs that are iced (or washed over with egg, and pow- dered sugar dredged over them, and then sprinkled with water), require a cooler oven than those that are not iced, for the oven if too hot will scorch or catch the icing, and discolour the goods. Leaving the oven door open will sometimes remedy this evil ; but the goods should not be too near the mouth of the oven in this case. Pastry, when soaked or baked sufficiently, can be handled or slid about the baking-tins, or lifted from the patty pans without breaking, if properly and sufficiently baked. Good pastry requires to be placed on clean tins, of in patty-pans, without using butter or grease of any kind.
To Ice Tarts and Pastry, etc.
Make a wash with two whites of eggs to \ pint of water. Put the whites into the water, and then whisk it ; if the whites are whisked before going into the water, they will not mix freely, but will settle as a froth upon the top of the water. Dip a paste- brush into this liquid, and lightly wash over the pastry ; then thickly dredge over it some castor-sugar, and sprinkle with the wash. Do not put on too much wash, or it may run off and disfigure the goods. If the dredging, etc., is carefully managed, a thick coating of frosted or glazed sugar will be produced. If f the sugar is put on thin, the heat of the oven will quickly melt and brown it, giving it the semblance of a varnish. Therefore, according to the desired appearance of the goods should be apportioned the quantity of added sugar.
The question whether to ice pastry before or after putting into the oven is dependent upon the size and weight of the article to be baked and the heat of the oven it is baked in. If the pastry is small, and the oven not too hot, then, as in the case of Coventrys and articles of that size, they can be iced before trans- ference to the oven. But care is always necessary in baking pastry that has been iced previousiy, because the sugar browns and burns very easily. If the oven be cool, fruit pies may like- wise be sugared before going in; but with a hot oven, large pastry or pies should be partially baked before icing. In the latter case, if the articles be taken out before the pastry is set, there will be danger of its collapsing and becoming heavy. Allow the paste to become set before moving.
A very nice icing is made by whipping whites of eggs to a froth, and with a brush laying it over the paste, which is then to be covered thickly with sugar and sprinkled with water.
To make a Vol-au-vent
As soon as the puff has received the last turn, roll it out to about half an inch in thickness, and then with the vol-au-vent
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