Take two deep dishes, and sift three quarters of a pound of flour
into each. Make a hole in the centre of one of them, and pour in a
wine glass of the best brewer's yeast; mix the flour gradually
into it, wetting it with lukewarm milk; cover it, and set it by
the fire to rise for about two hours. This is setting a sponge. In
the mean time, cut up five ounces of butter into the other dish of
flour, and rub it fine with your hands; add half a pound of
powdered sugar, a tea-spoonful of powdered cinnamon, a grated
nutmeg, a table-spoonful of rose water, and a half pint of milk.
Beat three eggs very light, and stir them hard into the mixture.
Then when, the sponge is perfectly light, add it to the other
ingredients, mixing them all thoroughly with a knife. Cover it,
and set it again by the fire for another hour. When, it is quite
light, flour your paste-board, turn out the lump of dough, and cut
it into thick diamond shaped cakes with a jagging iron. If you
find the dough so soft as to be unmanageable, mix in a little more
flour; but not else. Have ready a skillet of boiling lard; put the
dough-nuts into it, and fry them brown; and when cool grate loaf-sugar
over them. They should be eaten quite fresh, as next day
they will be tough and heavy; therefore it is best to make no more
than you want for immediate use. The New York Oley Koeks are
dough-nuts with currants and raisins in them.