Many years ago, my grandmother gave me an old recipe box that belong to my grandfather’s aunt. I was glad to receive it, but until recently, I hadn’t given it much thought. I came across it the other day while organizing the kitchen cabinets, and I set it out on the counter.
When I had time to look through it last weekend, I was immediately grateful to have this culinary time capsule. The box belonged to my Great, Great Aunt Marie Lena Rebekah. My grandma, correct in assuming I’d confuse Aunt Marie with my grandpa’s step mother Anna Marie, left me a note in the front of the box. (Never one to be wasteful, she wrote this note on the back of a funeral program. Seeing her handwriting and being reminded again of her quirks made the time all that much more worthwhile.)
I found that most of the recipes were desserts, which immediately endeared me to this woman I’d never met. She had an entire sections devoted to icing alone.
Most of the cards were handwritten with a fountain pen. Aside from some tearing around the edges and smeared ink, they are in remarkable shape. I found several recipes for burnt sugar cake and settled on the one that seemed to be the most used, hoping that it meant it was a favorite.
The recipe starts, as you might expect, with burnt sugar:
The instructions were a bit vague, as though she was familiar with the process and only needed to capture the measurements. The recipe noted two egg whites to be added at the end, for instance, and after sampling the cake, I know she must have intended they be whipped and folded in.
As the cakes baked, Ava and I made a burnt sugar filling, which was incredibly sweet and almost crunchy. The fact that I had a Kitchen-Aid and battery-operated candy thermometer at my disposal didn’t pass unnoticed.
Ava and I finished the cake with a burnt sugar frosting recipe we found online, and topped it with walnuts. The cake was moist (if not a little dense due to my misstep with the egg whites), and the filling and frosting were sweet enough to make a tiny piece satisfying. I will likely make this again with a few adjustments, and I am looking forward to seeing what else I can find in Aunt Marie’s recipe box.
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