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BEDFORDSHIRE
APPLE FLORENTINE PIE ( an 18th century Christmas dish )
Ingredients : -
4 good cooking apples; 2 tablespoonfuls sugar or golden
syrup; grated lemon peel; short pastry.
Core the apples, wash them, and place in a deep pie-dish. Put sugar
over them and lemon peel and cover with short pastry. Bake in a moderate oven for 30 minutes. Remove the pastry,
pour the spiced ale over, cut pastry into required pieces and put back on the dish. Serve hot.
Spiced Ale: Hot Spiced Ale: 1 pint ale; a little nutmeg and cinnamon; 1 clove; 1 tablespoonful sugar.
Heat the ale very gently with the spices and sugar. Do not let it boil. It used to be served in a very large pewter dish.
BAKED ONION BUTTER
This used to be a popular sauce served with meat.
Ingredients : -
1 onion (medium-sized); 4 ounce butter.
Take all the juice from the onion and stir into the butter in a saucepan.
Brown the butter and serve hot.
CATHERINE CAKES (or Kattern
Cakes)
called after Catherine of Aragon, the Queen, who used to live at Ampthill Castle, a favourite lace-making district.Catherine
Cakes were specially made for her on the the 25th November, St. Catherine's Day.
Ingredients : -
2 lbs. dough; 2 ounces butter; 2 ounces sugar; 1 egg;
a few caraway seeds.
Dough made with yeast, as for bread. Knead well with butter, caraway
seeds, sugar and egg. Leave to rise in a warm place for 2 hours. Place on floured baking tin and bake in a moderate
oven for 2-3 hours.
BACON PUDDING
Ingredients : -
1 lb. flour; 6 ounces suet; 6 ounces fat bacon; 2 Onions;
a little sage; salt and pepper.
Make a stiff paste with flour, shredded suet and water. Roll out ½
( half ) an inch thick. Cover with bacon and chopped onions mixed with sage and seasoning. Roll up pastry and secure
at both ends, wrap up in cloth and boil for 2 hours.
FAGGOTS (also
called Harslet)
Pork scraps seasoned with chopped onions, sage, pepper and salt.
POOR KNIGHTS OF WINDSOR
Ingredients : -
8 slices of bread, ½ ( half ) an inch thick;
a little white wine or milk; a little butter or lard; a little Jam.
Put white wine or milk and sugar into a dish; dip the bread in it
on both sides. Then fry bread gently, on both sides, in a little hot fat. Dish up on a hot plate and spread a little
jam or sugar or cinnamon over it.
WINDSOR FRUIT PIES
These were made in Windsor with any kind of fruit in season.
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE
AYLESBURY CHERRY BUMPERS
These are large cherry turnovers.
CRAYFISH
Crayfish is a freshwater lobster and is found in
English rivers in limestone district., The shell is much thinner than that of a lobster and the flesh has a very delicate flavour. Most lobster recipes are suitable for crayfish. Crayfish should not be confused with crawfish (the French langouste), which is found only in the sea and is similar to a lobster but it is like a large prawn in that it has no claws.
STOKENCHURCH PIE
Ingredients : -
lb. flour; 1½ lbs. (one and a half lb.) meat
(any cooked meat or scrag) ; 8 ounces lard; 3 hard-boiled eggs ; 4 ounces macaroni; a little salt; a little water.
Mince the meat and add to a little thickened stock. Boil the macaroni in salt water until tender, cut up and mix
with meat. Cut up the eggs in quarters. Make a good pastry with flour and lard, roll out and line a well-greased
tin. Put in half the meat, the eggs, and then the rest of the meat on top. Cover with pastry. Make a hole in the
centre, decorate the top with bits of pastry, and brush over with milk. Bake in a hot oven for 30 minutes.
CAMBRIDGE SAUCE
Cambridge sauce is similar to mayonnaise, served cold with cold dishes. The ingredients are oil and vinegar, yokes
of hard-boiled eggs, tarragon, chives, capers, chervil, and a little cayenne.
CAMBRIDGE SAUSAGES
Cambridge sausages are made of pork and sold in skins. Oxford sausages used to be skinless.
ELY MILK CHEESE
Ely milk cheeses were made at Sutton, near Ely, and sold on straw matting.
CHESHIRE CHEESE
Cheshire cheese is the oldest of English cheeses. It is hard and there are three kinds: red, white and blue. The
red is artificially coloured; some of it develops blue veins and loses its red colour, The blue is the strongest
in flavour and the red the mildest. "Cheshire" cheese is not so good when made elsewhere, since the true
flavour derives from the saline composition of the milk of Cheshire cows, which feed in fields whose soil is rich
in salt. (Cheshire Cheese)
CHESHIRE PORK PIE
Ingredients : -
Pork; apples; salt, pepper, and nutmeg to taste; sugar;
a little white wine or cider; a little butter; short crust pastry.
Layers of pork and apples seasoned with salt, pepper, nutmeg and sugar. Add a little white wine or cider and a little butter on top. Cover with pastry and bake in a moderate oven for 45 minutes.
CHESTER PUDDING
Ingredients : -
4 ounces flour; 4 ounces bread crumbs; 4 ounces shredded
suet; 2 ounces castor sugar; 4 ounces blackcurrant jam; a little milk; a little bi-carbonate of soda; a little
salt.
Mix flour, bread crumbs, suet and sugar. Make a well in the centre
and put in the jam; warm the milk, add the bi-carbonate of soda to it and pour over the jam. Mix everything together.
Place in a well-greased basin or mould and steam for 3 hours. Serve with blackcurrant jam sauce.
FLUMMERY
The name is now applied to any starch jelly made from cereals, wheat flour, rice, ground rice, sago, etc. It used
to apply to oatmeal only, eaten with honey, wine, sack, claret, strong beer, ale or milk. It is like porridge,
but when the oats are cooked they are passed through a sieve, sugar is added and orange flower water. It is then
put into shallow dishes and served with one of the beverages mentioned above.
SMELTS
( Lincolnshire )
CORNISH PASTY
The great distinction between the Cornish pasty and any other kind of pasty is that the ingredients are raw, not
previously cooked remains. The pasty is joined at the side, and the hoggan is made without potato and is joined
at the top.
Ingredients : -
½ lb.( half ) flour ; 3 ounces dripping or lard
; pinch salt ; water to make fine dough - about 1 gill.
Filling : 1 lb. beefsteak ; ¼ lb. (quarter of a lb.) calf's liver ; 2 uncooked potatoes ; a large onion
; 1 medium-sized turnip ; a large or 2 small carrots ; pepper and salt.
Time to bake 1 hour. At first in a good oven to raise the pastry and then in a very moderate oven to cook the meat
and vegetables.
Roll out the dough fairly thin, cut in squares. Chop the steak and liver finely, mix together and season. Peel
or scrape, and slice the potato, onion, turnip and carrot. Mix and season the vegetables. Put a layer of vegetables
on half of each square of pastry and some of the chopped meat on top. Brush the edges of the pastry with white
of egg, fold the plain half over the meat and pinch the edges well together. Bake as above.
N.B. - It is important to close the edges neatly and closely so that no steam escapes, and to use uncooked meat
and vegetables. The contents cook in their own juices, so after the first few minutes require a very moderate oven.
The above amounts make 2 large or 3 medium pasties.
CORNISH SPLITS
Ingredients : -
1 lb. flour; 1 oz butter; half an ounce of yeast; half
an ounce of castor sugar; ½ (half) a pint of tepid milk; teaspoonful of salt.
Cream yeast and sugar until liquid, then add milk; sieve the flour and salt into a basin. Melt the butter; add
milk and salt with the butter to the flour and mix into a smooth dough. Let the dough rise in a cool place for
45 minutes. Then shape into round balls and bake in a floured baking tin in a hot oven for 15 - 20 minutes. Spilt
them, cover with butter and serve hot or let them get cold and serve with jam, cream or golden syrup.
EEL PIE
Ingredients : -
Eels; sweet herbs; suet pastry to cover; a little water;
handful of currants.
Cut the eels into 2-inch lengths, place them in a pie dish, add sweet seasoning, a handful of currants, a little
butter, cover with suet pastry and bake in n moderate oven for about 40 minutes.
FAIRINGS
Ingredients : -
1 lb. flour; 8 ounces sugar (Demerara); 5 ounces butter;
2 ounces lard; 4 ounces lemon peel; a little mixed spice; 8 ounces syrup; half an ounce bi-carbonate of soda; a
little tartaric acid; 1 level teaspoonful ground ginger; a little powdered ammonia.
Rub fat into flour. Mix the spices, ammonia and sugar. Put the syrup into a bowl. Bring the soda to boil in a little
water in a saucepan, add to syrup. Repeat with the tartaric add until it froths, then mix all into the flour, and
add finely cut lemon peel. Mix into soft paste and roll out into about one inch thick strips and cut into pieces
one inch long. Bake in warm oven on a greased tin for about 30 - 40 minutes. Allow for the biscuits to spread while
baking.
FIGGIE HOBBIN
Ingredients : -
2 ounces suet; 2 ounces, lard; a little milk; 8 ounces
flour; 8 ounces dried figs ; teaspoonful baking powder.
Rub suet, lard and baking powder into flour; add figs cut up finely. Mix to a stiff paste with milk. Roll into 4 - inch squares, half an inch thick. Cut across the top and bake half an hour on a greased tin in a fairly hot oven.
Ingredients : -
One and a half lbs. flour; 4 ounces butter or cream;
4 ounces beef dripping; 12 ounces currants; 2 dessert spoonfuls sugar; 1 teaspoonful salt; a little grated lemon
peel.
Mix butter and dripping roughly into the flour. Mix in the other ingredients, add a little water and make into
a stiff dough. Roll out on a board, then roll it up again and put aside for an hour or two. Roll out again. Cut
across with a knife; the cake will then be light. Bake for 20-30 minutes in a fairly hot oven.
HERB PASTY
Ingredients : -
Pastry; parsley; chopped shallots; bits; cut up spinach;
slice of bacon; 1 egg.
Prepare pastry as for pasties. Take equal quantities of parsley, finely chopped shallots, bits (a North Cornish
herb), spinach, some finely cut slices of bacon and a well-beaten egg. Pour boiling water over the herbs, leave
to stand a little, squeeze all moisture out of the herbs. Mix all together except the egg and put into the pastry.
Before quite closing it, add the egg, finish pinching, and bake in quick oven.
HOGGAN
This is the same as a pasty, but it is closed at the top instead of the side. ( See Cornish Pasty above ).
KIDLEY BROTH
Cut bread into squares; take a few marigold heads, a few stalks of chives (called "scifers" in Cornwall)
chopped fine, a little butter, pepper and salt. Put in a basin, pour boiling water over and serve.
LEEKIE PASTIES
Boil leeks for 10 minutes, strain well, cut into lengths, according to the size of the pasties. season with pepper
and salt and bake in the usual way.
LIKKY PIE
Ingredients : -
12 leeks; 8 ounces green bacon; 4 ounces cream; 2 eggs:
a little milk; suet crust.
Cut the leeks into small pieces and scald for about to minutes.
Cut the bacon into fine slices and place at the bottom of a pie-dish, then a layer of leeks, and go on until the
dish is full. Season with pepper. Cover with suet crust. When the pie is cooled, remove the crust, drain off the
liquid and add the cream and separately-beaten yolks and whites of egg.
MANCHOTS, Manchants or Manchets
This is wheaten bread, shaped by hand.
METHEGLIN
Ingredients : -
4 lbs. honey; 1 gallon water; hops; 1 gill brandy;
thyme, rosemary, sweet briar, and heather, if desired.
Boil water with the honey for 1 hour, skim well, then add 102 hops to every gallon: boil for half an hour, then let it stand for 24 hours. Put into cask or bottles. Add 1 gill brandy to every gallon. Put a stopper on tightly. Keep one year before use. If desired, sweet herbs can be added when boiling the water, before adding the honey.
PICKLED PILCHARDS
Pilchards are fat sardines or herrings and are best enjoyed near coasts where they are caught, as they do not travel
well. They are most plentiful around the coasts of Devon and Cornwall. To pickle pilchards, cut off the heads,
remove scales and wash well. Stand them in a jar with a bay leaf, peppercorns, a clove, and salt. Fill up with
equal quantities of water and vinegar. Place in a moderate oven for about 1 hour, take out, seal and store.
SAFFRON CAKES
Ingredients : -
1 lb. 2 ounces flour; 2 ounces , mixed peel; 8 ounces
currants;4 ounces butter; 3 ounces sugar; 4 ounces lard; a pinch of saffron; a pinch of nutmeg; a little milk and
salt; ; half an oz yeast .
Mix the ingredients together well, add the yeast, leave till the dough rises and bake in a moderate oven for 50
- 60 minutes.
STAR-GAZY PIE
Ingredients : -
6 herrings, mackerel or pilchards; 3 or 4 eggs or cream;
tarragon vinegar; a little pepper and salt; a little parsley; bread crumbs; pastry.
Clean and bone the fish well and season with salt, pepper and chopped parsley. Do not cut off heads. Place in a
pie-dish lined with fat and bread crumbs with heads facing inwards. Pour 3 or 4 eggs beaten in tarragon vinegar
or cream over them. Put a pastry over the dish (with potatoes as for pasties), leaving a hole in the middle for
the heads to stick out. Bake for about 1 hour in a moderate oven. Place parsley into the mouths of the fish before
serving.
THUNDER AND LIGHTNING
These are Cornish splits eaten with cream and treacle, or jam.
