Sorry that all these measurements are in Victorian; if you really can't convert 'em (what do they teach kids in schools these days, mutter, mutter), then try this link.
My Grandad Keay first - as he & his fathers were bakers it only seems right.
Grandad was quite happy to pass recipes on - you might think that they'd be 'secret' family or bakery recipes. However, he did insist on giving them in industrial quantities which meant having to divide everything by 56!
He gave my Mum a lovely sticky ginger cake recipe but warned about the ginger essence which, in the bakery, he carefully added by the spoonful. Trainees had to be shown that care was needed 'cos it could eat through the container it arrived in!!
Some remember trying to get him to demonstrate some baking - but he would send his pupil off to wash hands, and then the job would be practically finished by the time you arrived to start learning!
He made a lovely teabread/fruitcake by this boiling method...
Grandad's Date Loaf
Add to a large bowl:
- 6 oz sugar
- half a pound of dates, de-stoned & roughly chopped
- 1 tbsp margarine
- 1 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
Pour a cup of boiling water over all this and mix well, till the margarine melts.
Allow to cool slightly. Keep the kids' fingers OUT of the mix, but make sure that you hook out a few yummy dates, just to check they are right.
Next add:
- 8 oz SR flour
- 1 beaten egg
and mix to a dropping consistency.
Pour into a lined loaf tin (1 lb) and bake at Gas Mk 4 (350 deg F) for an hour.
For variety, you could also add some chopped walnuts (or pieces of stem ginger) in place of some of the dates.
Next the famous:
Shortbread of Aunt Helen
Thanks to Aunty Jackie & Uncle David for there help here; but the main credit, of course, goes to Aunt Helen.
And before you think, "Och no, I'll just buy some" - don't be so lazy, if our Great Super Aunt Helen can still knock out a batch or six of Shortbread, then so can you!!!!
- 4 oz icing sugar
- 8 oz Anchor butter
- 8 oz plain flour
- 4 oz cornflour
Cream the sugar and butter, then mix in the flours. Roll out to about 0.5” thick and cut into shapes (or bake as a whole shape - round perhaps - it's up to you).
Cook at Gas Mk 6 for 15 minutes. Bake until just blond - don't overbake or it'll be dry.
Optional: Before cooking prick the tops with a fork and then when they come out of the oven sprinkle with caster sugar
I like to vary mine with flavours such as lemon, ginger, walnuts (if very fresh), but I feel sure this wouldn't be approved Up North. Also, in my own way of disapproval, I use a locally made butter as that saves the food miles; whereas Aunt Helen insists on Anchor butter. So that's why mine is never quite like the real thing...
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If you'd rather listen than cook, why not try Acrid Spag? (Caution, external websites may offend. I'm not responsible, even if I did send you there...)
They write ditties where the lyrics are entirely copied out of recipe books. Nigella Lawson books seem to be favourite. (An author, like Nigel Slater, whose work I enjoy reading almost as much as I enjoy eating their food!) I heard them first on the Mitch Benn podcast; unreliable but fairly interesting, if slightly self-obsessed. Well, aren't we all.
One of the band members made this rather swish website / experience (as in swish, over my head)
Another post follows here, about food memories in the Sennett family (my maternal line, to get all genealogical on you).
Cheers!
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