The mixing of cake often has more to do with its texture than the proportion of materials used, though both have their influence.

It is an interesting experiment to make a good cooky dough and bake portions of it with different proportions of flour. Take, for example, the familiar 1-2-3-4 cake formulas and transpose the flour and eggs so that we use one cup of butter, two cups of sugar, three eggs and four cups of flour. The stiffness of this dough will vary with size of the eggs and the quality of the flour. Often some liquid and more flour are added, making a less rich mixture, and then some baking-powder or its equivalent will be needed, otherwise the creaming of the butter and the eggs will bring sufficient air into the dough.

Even before all the flour is worked in, some of the dough may be spread on a tin and cut in shapes after baking. When slightly stifter, bits of the mixture may be dropped on the tin, fruit or nuts put over them, and they will spread out in dainty little cakes.

If still more flour is added, but before the dough is quite firm enough to use a rolling-pin, small balls of the dough may be shaped round with the hands and flattened on the pan with the under surface of a smooth tin cup.

A dough in this stage may be chilled, and then can be rolled easily, and the resulting cakes will be much richer than if more flour had been worked in.

Deft, experienced hands produce satisfactory results with doughs, because they can shape them without working in an excessive amount of flour.