Photoplay (Jan - Jun 1941)

HERE COMES COOKIE V PATTY cake, patty cake, Baker's Man Miss Weidler can bake as well as you can She rolls dough and pats it and marks it with V And puts it in the oven for Virginia— and all the rest of the Weidler family, not to mention the assorted young fry population who lives near by. Now you wouldn't believe that Virginia, in addition to being one of the i of our younger performers, would have time to rook, would you'.' She's such a versatile little stai . even though h< only 13 years old, thai you somehov thai that's career enough. 1 know it had never occurred to me that I know the difference between a rolling pin and a flour sifter until the day I watched her working with Ann Rutherford and John Shelton on the set of "Keeping Company," her latest picture since "The Philadelphia Story." 'Ki Company" is a story about typical small-town people and in it a little girl who is pretty :, hke the Virginia of real li interested in the usual teen-age activiwhich includ around" in Mi tchen Alter Virginia had finished I o teast her about her make-believe hou activit 102 Virginia Weidler, "other woman" with John Shelton and Ann Rutherford in "Keeping Company" "But it isn't make-believe," she said seriously. There are six children in the Weidler family and Virginia explained that with a family of that size, Mrs. Weidler believes they should all learn how to do things about the house; and although Virginia is the y I the six, already she knows as much about homemaking as lots of older girls. "But dusting and sweeping and washing dishes are easy," I said. "I'll bet you can't cook " "Bet I can," Virginia answered. "I dare you to come out tomorrow and So I accepted the dare who wouldn't, I ask you? Next day I went out to the Weidler home and sat by watching while Virginia measured and sifted and mixed 1 ■ okies shown I iNCER COOKIFS 1 cup shortening • cup sugar 1 cup molasses 'i cup sour milk 2 tsps. sod. i 1 tsp gin ■j tsp. salt ips Hour i ream the shortening, add the butter and cream together until light and Huffy, ■ ther the soda, ginger, sail :■• BY ANN HAMILTON flour and add it to the creamed mix ture, alternately with the milk. Adc only a little at a time, beating well aftei each addition. Chill for fifteen to thirty minutes, then roll thin and bake or buttered baking sheet in a moderate oven t for twelve minutes. For icing, Virginia used two egg whites beaten stiff, with two tablespoons of corr syrup beaten into it. As you can see she likes fancy decorations. Sometime; she tints the icing pink or green witr fruit coloring and puts it through pastry tube made of white paper rollec like a cornucopia. Some of the cookie! are decorated with cinnamon or chocolaU drops, or with colored candies, grounc up to form coarse crumbs. Of course, every young cook likes t< bake cake and Virginia is no exception. "All kinds of cake are nice,"' she said} "but I like chocolate and I like it witl chocolate frosting. Mama says most any one can be sure of cake if you use th< right flour and sift and measure it righ and make it at the proper temperature and my cake is pretty good." • Virginia's Chocolate Cake 1 2 cup shortening 1'4 cups sugar 2 eggs 3 squares cooking chocolate 2 cups flour l2 tsp. salt 'i tsp. soda 2 tsps. baking powder 1 cup milk 1 tsp. vanilla Cream the shortening and add tfo sugar as you did for the cookies, thei add the chocolate — which has been melted over hot water — and the eggs am mix well Sift the flour and other dr ingredients together and add, alternatel; with the milk, to the chocolate mixture. Put in the vanilla last and bak> in two 9inch layer cake pans in a modn for thirty minu: "The chocolate icing," Virginia .id mitted, "hasn't worked out so well. Tv> having trouble with it— getting thf '■■ cooking time right and so on. So nov I've found a frosting that doesn't hav> f to be cooked and I'm going to stid to that in the future because it's quid and it always works." Uncookkd Chocolate Frosting 3 squares Cooking I 2 this, cream 1 tbl. butter 1 ' cups confectioners' suj the chocolate over hoi watt cream and butter and beat together unti butter is melted and mixture is cool Adc infectioners' sugar slowly. steadilj until the tnixtui i thick. Spread between laj i : d sides ot i ■ i-i av combined with MOVI1 I Mtmr ' li