Charlotte messenger. [volume] (Charlotte, Mecklenburg Co., N.C.) 1882-18??, 1883-01-06
BUCKwHEAT CAKES.
How They Are Made When the Proper sea-
son for Them Arrives-New Tangled No
lions Introduced.

In eating, as in everything else, the
vast majority of people are governed
more by the season than by any actual,
arbitrary condition of appetite. Take,
for instance, buckwheat flour. The
item "buckwheat cakes" says the
New York World, is never seen on the
bill of fare of any restaurant in New
York in summer, and the cakes are
never seen on the table of a private
family in hot weather. In most of the
restaurants, as matter of form, the
item of "buckwheat cakes is put on
the bill of fare about the middle of
October or the beginning of Noyem-
ber. Their sale, however, never
amounts to anything until cold winter
weather sets in, while wheat, rice and
oatmeal cakes are sold and eaten the
year round.
With view to ascertaining definitely
something about the restaurant trade
in buckwheat cakes, now that the
buckwheat season is about to begin, a
reporter of the World visited several of
the downtown restaurants early this
season and questioned the prOprietOrS
and managers on the subject. His
instructions were to find out the extent
of the consumption, whether there are
any new inventions in griddle cakes,
and the actual ingredients of the
material furnished in some restaurants
as ''pure maple syrup
Regarding the first item-the amount
of buckwheat cakes sold and eaten
the result was not satisfactory, for the
reason that in many places where grid
dle-cakeS of different kinds were sold,
buckwheat had not yet been added to
the list, while in places where they had
been placed on the bill of fare it was
said that the sales had not yet been
very extensive. At one place in Broad
street the manager said that as yet the
orders for buckwheat cakes had not
been very brisk and would not be until
cold weather set in. When the season
fairly opened he expected to sell 200
OF 300 plates Il day, varying according
to the state of the weather. The
colder it is the more buckwheat cakes
are called for. Speaking of the guam
tity of the cakes furnished at this place
the manager said: Il am not prepared
to say how generally the practice may
prevail in New York restaurants of
producing real genuine old-fashiOned
buckwheat cakes such as our grand
mothers used to make. but | am pre-
pared to say that the cakes made here
are made in the same way and are the
real, genuine, simon-pure article, and
no mistake. In the first place,
buy my buckwheat in Sullivan cOun-
ty, where l also have a farm,
and where they raise the
best buckwheat grown in this
country and 1 know the flour is pure
and genuine. Then l have the latter
mixed over night with yeast and stood
by to ''rise" until morning. In the
morning all that it is necessary to do
is to stir in a little more flour. stir in a
little soda to Sweeten it, and you have
light, spOngy batter which will bake
into cakes which will almost "melt in
the mouth" as the saying is. If the
''run" of the cakes does not exceed the
previous nights calculation, enough
batter will be left over at night to form
the yeast basis for the next days sup
ply, and if SO, so much the better. Our
gTandmOtherS used to put the batter
pan brewing" as soon as the product
of the first ''threshing" of buckwheat
was obtained in the fall, and never
allow it to become exhausted until the
last "threshing" was exhausted. The
! Oh
Ing entirely, the better the cakes will
be. While, however, it is possible to
do this in private family of a given
number of persons, it may not always
be possible to do it in place like this.
because it frequently happens that our
customers seem to get up corner
on cakes and clean us out complete
ly before we know it. Now, the diff
ference between the old-fashioned'
buckwheat cakes, such as have been
telling you about, and those sold at
some places in New York, cannot fail
to be appreciated by those who have
tested both kinds, or who can recollect
as far back as the good old days of
home and "honest hominy" A great
many restaurant keepers use that new
tangled abomination in culinary art,
prepared -four" in the manufacture
of buckwheat cakes, and the result is
hard, tough, heavy, soggy substance,
just about as indigestible as so much
shoe leather. and no more resembling
buckwheat cake than chalk resem-
bles cheese. Then there are others who
do even worse than that, and produce
a cake the batter for which is mixed