The Royal “Mouth”

Some light was shed on the minor mystery of the Queen’s “mouth” in Friday’s story by a commenter who pointed out that the French term for the office responsible for provisioning the royal household was the “Bouche”, which translates literally as “the mouth.” I should have remembered – after all, I featured a lovely book called The Perfect School of Instruction for the Officers of The Mouth in a blog post some time ago.

The book was published in England in 1682 by Giles Rose, and was a translation of a French work written twenty years before. Not much is known about Rose, except that (according to the frontispiece of the book) he was one of the Master Cooks to Charles II. The book examines the roles of the senior staff responsible for feeding a large household – specifically the Maistre de Hostel (or Steward), the Master Carver, Master Butler, Master Cook, Master Confectioner, and Master Pastryman. In the previous story I gloried in both the wonderfully detailed title page of the book, and the knowledge that when I throw a kitchen towel over my shoulder while I am cooking, I am modelling the ‘ordinary Mark, and particular sign and demonstration’ of the office of the Maistre de Hostel (from which we get Maître d’hôtel, or simply Maître d).

I promised in that post to return to the book to explore the roles of the other household staff. I am belatedly doing so, now I have been reminded of its treasures. Before I move on to the Carver and Butler and so on, there is a little more of interest in the role of the Steward (to use his English job description). His job ‘especially amongst Persons of Quality’, was ‘none of the least in a Family, no more than his charge is inconsiderable’ for he had the overall responsibility of running what could be a very large household with a large number of family members, staff, visitors, and visitors’ servants. He had to maintain an inventory of the household goods, give instructions to each of the other Masters as to the catering requirements for each day, to order, organise, monitor and track the distrubution of provisions, and keep a meticulous account of expenses.

The Steward’s work was not all behind the scenes however, he did have his time in the spotlight. When the first course was dished up and ready, he would lead the procession carrying it to the table, and, ‘being come into the Hall, where the Company are to eat’, would doff his hat to his Lord before overseeing the placement of the dishes. The shoulder-towel then came into use:

‘The Company disposting themselves to wash their hands, he takes the Towel by both ends and delivers it to the Company, neatly, with care and respect, and not rudely; and when the Ceremony is ended, and all have wiped their hands, then he takes the Towel away again, and carries it to the side-Cupboard, and there leaves it.’

The Steward then took up a position behind his Master’s Chair, ‘or some one of the chiefest persons at the Table, till it be time to fetch in the second Course’ – always vigilant for a sign from his Master or Mistress as to their commands for the progress of the meal.

There cant be too many jobs available for good household stewards nowadays, but history is full of disappearances and reappearances and fashions and unfashions. In the earlier post on this topic I gave you a recipe from the book for A Tart of the Brain of a Capon, which seems unlikely to be fashionable again soon. Perhaps the following tart, also from the book, might be closer to re-invention?

A Tart of Green Sprouts.
Take your green Sprouts of green Colworts, give them a set or scald in hot Water, and lay thema draining, then mince them small, and put them in fine Paste, and garnish them with the Hearbs, season them with Lard melted, Beef-marrow, an Onion stuck with Cloves and Pepper, and some thin slices of interlarded Bacon between the laying of the Hearbs, cover it up with the same Paste, and when it is baked, put in some Gravy, and the juice of a Lemon, and serve it away.


Quotation for the Day.

A thriving household depends on the use of seasonal produce and the application of common sense.
Olivier de Serres (1539-1619)

Amber Pudding.

It goes without saying that colour is important in food. As far as vegetables are concerned, nutritionists tell us that the intensely-coloured varieties are especially good for us. As far as cooked dishes are concerned, cooks and chefs everywhere know that some colours attract and some repel. Last October we explored the themes of red, yellow, blue, and green food, and I was reminded of this when I got briefly diverted by Amber Pudding while I was deciding over yesterday’s recipe. It was rejected on the day, because it did not contain ambergris, but it is too delicious to reject utterly. Recipes for Amber Pudding appear regularly in nineteenth century cookbooks, the name coming from its beautiful golden-amber colour, which in turn comes from the butter, egg yolks, and candied orange it contains.

Golden-coloured food seems particularly appealing. Is there some sort of inherited attraction because of the long association with the ripe, golden grains that have been staple foods for our species for millenia? Or is it just a potato chips and custard thing?

Amber Pudding seems worthy of re-discovering, perhaps in the form of little tartlets for the petits fours platter at your next dinner party?


A Very Fine Amber Pudding.
Put a pound of butter into a sauce-pan, with three quarters of a pound of loaf sugar finely powdered; melt the butter, and mix well with it; then add the yolks of fifteen eggs well beaten, and as much fresh candied-orange as will add colour and flavour to it, being first beaten to a fine paste. Line the dish with paste for turning out; and when filled with the above, lay a crust over, as you would, a pie, and bake in a slow oven. It is as good cold as hot.
A new system of domestic cookery, by a Lady (M.E. Rundell) 1808

Quotation for the Day.

Custard: A detestable substance produced by a malevolent conspiracy of the hen, the cow, and the cook.
Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary (1906)

Aussie puds, final episode.

Next week I think we will hurtle back into the sixteenth century for some good food ideas (or at least interesting food ideas), but today is the final day (for the time being) on the topic of dishes named for Australian places.  I have a motley collection of ‘puddings’ for you again.

From New Standard Cookery Illustrated, by Elizabeth Craig, 1933 we have three more:

Tasmanian Pineapple Whip
1 large pineapple
1 cupful Castor sugar
¾ cupful water
2 egg whites
3 tablespoonfuls Cornflour
Glacé cherries.
Peel and remove eyes from pineappl. Cut 6 rings from the fruit and remove the cores. Simmer in water with sugar to taste till fruit is tender. Drain in a colander and chill. Grate enough of the remainder of the pineapple to make 2 cups grated fruit. Place this pulp with the ¾ cup water and sugar in a saucepan. Simmer till the fruit is cooked through. Mix cornflour to a paste with a little cold water. Stir into the pineapple pulp. Cook, stirring constantly utnil the mixture thickens. Remove from fire. Cool slightly.
Beat egg whites to a stiff froth and fold into cooled pulp. Pour into a mould rinsed in cold water. When set and chilled, turn out into a glass dish. Garnish with pineapple rings . Fill centres with glace cherries. Serve with lightly whipped cream.

Adelaide Sultana Roly-Poly.
½ lb flour
¼ level teaspoonful baking powder
¼ lb suet
¼ lb sultanas
1 ½ oz sugar
water to mix
2 oz breadcrumbs
2 tablespoonfuls Golden Syrup
1 ½ oz shelled walnuts or brazil nuts
½ flat teaspoonful ground ginger.
To make the filling warm the golden syrup in a saucepan. Stir in the breadcrumbs mixed with the ground ginger, also the nuts (which should have been put through a mincer). Mix all together and leave to cool.
Chop the suet finely and mix it with the flour and baking powder. Add the sugar and sultanas, and stir in sufficient water to make the mixture into a dough. Turn this on to a floured board, roll to an oblong shape, then turn it over to the other side and spread it with the prepared filling, leaving a good margin all round. Damp the edge and roll it up, pinching the edges firmly together at each end. Roll the pudding in a scalded and floured pudding-cloth and tie it securely. Put the pudding into boiling water and boil it for about 1 ½ to 2 hours.

Brisbane Currant and Honey Tart.
2 oz. currants
2 tablespoonfuls honey
2 tablespoonfuls breadcrumbs
a squeeze of lemon juice
6 oz short pastry
Roll out the pastry and line a pie-plate with it. Cut the edges neatly and roll out the trimmings into long thin strips. Put the honey in a saucepan with the lemon juice and warm it just enough to make it liquid.
Add the breadcrumbs and currants and fill the tart with the mixture. Twist the crossway pieces and lay themon the tart, pressing both the ends into place. Bake in a hot oven for about 20 minutes.


Quotation for the Day …

A food is not necessarily essential just because your child hates it.
Katherine Whitehorn

Summer, 1674

Today we go back in time to the seventeenth century – to 1674 to be exact, the year that the Treaty of Westminster recognised the inhabitants of New York and New Sweden as British subjects, the year that the Drury Lane theatre in London was rebuilt and re-opened after the great fire, and the year that the opera Alceste opened in Paris. The English hoi-poloi’s tastes were getting Frenchified, much to the disgust of many of the slightly less hoi-polloi. One of the results was the publication of a number of cookbooks to assist the fashionable transition, such as The English and French Cook; by several approved Cooks of London and Westminster, in 1674. A sampling of bills of fare was included, and to reproduce this one in time for dinner you will need to get your servants working as soon as they don their aprons for the day.

A Bill-of-Fare for Summer, for Flesh Days.

First Course.
A boiled meat of Cockerels
A chine of Mutton drawn with Lemon pill
A dish of Turkeys, larded.
Stewed Carps
A Haunch of Venison, boil’d with Colli-flowers
Leverets larded
A venison pasty
Capons roasted
Marrow puddings
A Lamb-pye
Geese roasted
A haunch of venison roasted
Udders and tongues boil’d with Cabbidge
A piece of boil’d Beef.

Second course.
Quails larded and roasted
Young Heron-sews larded
Young greese Pease
A dish of Soals
An Artichoke Pye
A dish of Cream
A dish of Ruffs
Butter’d Crabs
Cream and green Codlings
A dish of Chickens
A Kid roasted whole with a Pudding in its Belly
A souced Turbot
A dish of Artichokes
A chine of boil’d Salmon
A cold jole of Salmon
A dish of Knots
A dish of Partridges
A jole of Sturgeon
Gooseberry and Cherry-tarts
Young Ducks, boil’d
Potten Venison
A Westphalia-ham
Dryed Tongues

Almond Tart.
Take three quarters of a pound of blanch’d Almonds, and soak them a whilein Water, then pound them in a stone Morter, a wooden one will serve, or a deep Tray, put to them some Rosewater, when you have pounded them very well, pound them over again with a little Cream, then set on about a pint and a half of Cream over the fire, and put your pounded Almonds therin with some Cinamon, large Mace, and a grain of Musk fastened to a thread, stir it continually that it burn not to the bottom till it be thick, then take it off the fire, and beat in the yolks of four or five Eggs, and the whites of two, so season it with Sugar or Orengado, and bake it either in a dish or Paste.
Or you may only strain beaten Almonds with Cream, yolks of Eggs, Sugar, Cinamon and Ginger, boil it till thick fill your Tart, and when it is baked ice it.

Quotation for the Day …

There can be economy only where there is efficiency. Benjamin Disraeli

To the Officers of the Mouth.

October 29 ...

It may be true that you can judge a book by its cover, but what of the days before colour printing and graphic designers and the whole colourfull digital age? One clearly chose by the front page. Words instead of pictures. So they better be good words. And preferably a catchy title.

Below is one of my favourites, from a book published in 1682.

A Perfect School of
INSTRUCTIONS
For the
Officers of the Mouth:
SHEWING
The Whole ART
OF
A Master of the Household A Master Confectioner
A Master Carver A Master Cook
A Master Butler A Master Pastryman

Being a Work of singular Use for Ladies and
Gentlewomen, and all Persons whatsoever
that are desirous to be acquainted with the
most excellent ARTS of Carving, Cookery,
Pastry, Preserving, and Laying a Cloth for
Grand Entertainments. The like never before
Extant in any Language.

Adorned with Pictures curiously Ingraven
displaying the whole Arts.
-
By Giles Rose, one of the Master Cooks in
His Majesties Kitchen.

How could you resist a title like this? There are those of you who are vocal in your hatred of the word “foodie” – I know, because I have read your rants. Unfortunately, none of you have come up with a suitably catchy alternative. Could we co-opt “Officers of the Mouth”? OOMs for short? Giles was referring to the staff who made it all happen in the kitchens and at the dining tables of the well-off, but as few of us have servants these days the title is languishing, begging to be recycled and appreciated once more.

If, like me, you throw a towel over your shoulder while you are cooking, you may say that this is because you like to keep a wiping-cloth handy at all times. You may not have realised it, but you have also been demonstrating your rank at the top of the meal-producing hierarchy – as Steward, or Maistre de Hostel.

Giles explains it thus:

The hour of Meals being come, and all things are now in readiness, le Maistre de Hostel takes a clean Napkin, folded at length, but narrow, and throws it over his Shoulder, remembring that this is the ordinary Mark, and particular sign and demonstration of his Office: and to let men see how credible his Charge is, he must not be shamefaced, nor so much as blush, no not before any noble Personage, for his Place is rather an Honour than a Service, for he may do his Office with his Sword by his side, his Cloak upon his Shoulders, and his Hat on his Head; but his Napkin must be always upon his Shoulder, just in the posture I told you of before.

We will examine the job descriptions of the Master Carver and the other Officers in due course, but for now I leave you with the recipe for the day, also taken from Giles’ book. It is an especially delicious-sounding one that I am sure you will be unable to resist. Let me know how it turns out.

A Tart of the Brain of a Capon.
Mince the Brain of a Capon Raw, with as much Marrow, or Beef Suet, as the Flesh contains to, sheet your Patty-pan with fine Paste, and add to your Meat, Champignons, Truffles, Cockscombs, Sweet-breads of Veal, and season all this with a packet or bundle, Salt, Pepper, Nutmeg, and a little Lard beaten or melted, cover it with the same Paste, and indore* it, let it bake an hour and a half, then put into it, when it is baked, Pistaches, the juice of Lemons, and a good gravy in serving it away.

* indore = to make golden, for example by using an egg wash, or saffron - or occasionally real gold.

Tomorrow’s Story …

Primitive Cookery.

Quotation for the Day …

"What science demands more study than Cookery? You have not only, as in other arts, to satisfy the general eye, but also the individual taste of the persons who employ you; you have to attend to economy, which every one demands; to suit the taste of different persons at the same table; to surmount the difficulty of procuring things which are necessary to your work; to undergo the want of unanimity among the servants of the house; and the mortification of seeing unlimited confidence sometimes reposed in persons who are unqualified to give orders in the kitchen, without assuming consequence, and giving themselves airs which are almost out of reason, and which frequently discourage the Cook." Louis Eustache Ude.

A Belated Feast.

Today, April 4th …

In 1658 Samuel Pepys was “cut for the stone” – that is, he had surgery for a bladder stone. It was a common medical problem of the time, particularly amongst the wealthier folk who had little in the way of dairy produce in their diet. Butter was for the lower classes, and clean fresh milk was difficult to get in the cities, so city folk were more liable to suffer from Vitamin A deficiency – a known contributor to the problem. Specialised ‘stone-cutters’ were kept busy plying their trade, and a gruesome and risky procedure it was in the days before anaesthesia (the patient was strapped to the table) and sterilisation of instruments.

Surviving such surgery was indeed worth celebrating. Every year on the anniversary of his operation, Samuel had a special dinner. The actual day had been March 26th, but in 1663 he had been forced to postpone the celebration because the household was in a muddle due to his wife Elizabeth being ill, and “my servants being out of order” (they were in search of a new cook-maid.) The delayed dinner was finally held on this day, and what a good feast it was.

“…This being my feast, in lieu of what I should have had a few days ago, for my cutting of the Stone …… Very merry before, at, and after dinner, and the more for that my dinner was great and most neatly dressed by our own only mayde. We had a Fricasse of rabbits and chicken – a leg of mutton boiled – three carps in a dish – a great dish of a side of lamb – a dish roasted pigeons – a dish of four lobsters – three tarts – a Lampry pie, a most rare pie – a dish of anchoves – good wine of several sorts; and all things mightly and noble to my great content.”

Samuel Pepys’ diary is fascinating to histo-foodies, but he also recorded the political events of the day (well, you can't eat all the time). He lived through England’s eleven-year post-civil war government by the Commonwealth and Oliver Cromwell’s Protectorate, and the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660. In 1664 a piece of Royalist propaganda was published in the form of a cookbook purporting to be written by Elizabeth (“Joan”) Cromwell. In spite of its satirical tone, there are some interesting recipes in the book. Here is one for a tart that would not have been out of place on Samuel’s feast table.

To make a double Tart.
Take some codlings tenderly boyled and peel them, cut them in halves, fill your Tart, put into a quarter of a hundred of codlings a pound and a half of sugar, a few cloves, and a little cinnamon, close up the coffin and bake it; when it comes out of the Oven, take a quart of cream, six eggs, a quartern of sugar and a sliced nutmeg, beat all these well together, pour them into the Tart, then set your tart in the Oven for half a quarter of an hour, when it comes out, cut off the ley and having a lid cut in flowers ready, lay it on, and garnish it with preserves of damsons, resberries, apricocks and cherries, and place a preserved quince in the middle, and strew it with sugar biskets.

Tomorrow’s Story …

Spanish Stew.

Last Year on This Day …

Tinned apricots were the topic of the day.

Quotation for the Day …

The longer I work in nutrition, the more convinced I become that for the healthy person all foods should be delicious. Adele Davis (1904-1974)

Second Breakfast.

Today, March 16th …

The novelist Sybille Bedford was born on this day in 1911. Her surname was a legacy of her brief marriage to an Englishman – she was in fact born in Charlottenberg, (Germany) of an aristocratic German father and an Italian mother.

Sybille’s childhood was spent in Germany, England, and Italy, and she continued her International life in adulthood. She often wrote lyrically about food, and there is a superb illustration of this in her novel A Legacy, which is set amongst a community of wealthy Berlin jews.

They were at second breakfast. Second breakfast was laid every morning at eleven-fifteen on a long table in the middle of the Herrenzimmer, a dark, fully furnished room with heavily draped windows that led from an antechamber to an antechamber. The meal was chiefly for the gentlemen. They ate cold Venison with red-currant jelly, potted meats, tongue and fowl accompanied by pumpernickel toast and rye-bread, and they drank port wine. Grandmama sat with them. She had a newly-laid egg done in cream, and nibbled at some soft rolls with Spickgans, smoked breast of goose spread on butter and chopped fine. Grandpapa had a hot poussin-chicken baked for him every day in a small dish with a lid; and Cousin Markwald who had a stomach ailment ate cream of wheat, stewed sweetbreads and a special kind of rusks.

This magnificent concept of Second Breakfast is a particularly German idea (did they get it from the Hobbits, or vice-versa?). It is a meal coming between first breakfast and lunch which is too substantial to be called ‘morning tea’ (or elevenses or smoko), and yet is too early for lunch. Apparently special dishes are made just for this meal, which makes me wonder why on earth I haven’t visited Germany yet (soon, I hope, soon ..). One of the very traditional things at this meal, is, I am told Weißwurst – a white sausage made early in the day (presumably before first breakfast) to be eaten within a few hours.

I am given to believe that the average German gets through 67 pounds of sausage per year! I wonder how much of this is at Second Breakfast? We have previously looked at old recipes for Zervelat and Bratwurst from the mid-sixteenth century cookbook of Sabina Welserin, but sadly, she does not include one for Weißwurst – I hope a German reader will enlighten us here.

Here are a couple of other recipes from her book which might be very nice even for Third Breakfast, which someone really ought to invent.

A tart with plums, which can be dried or fresh

Let them cook beforehand in wine and strain them and take eggs, cinnamon and sugar. Bake the dough for the tart. That is made like so: take two eggs and beat them. Afterwards stir flour therein until it becomes a thick dough. Pour it on the table and work it well, until it is ready. After that take somewhat more than half the dough and roll it into a flat cake as wide as you would have your tart. Afterwards pour the plums on it and roll out after that the other crust and cut it up, however you would like it, and put it on top over the tart and press it together well and let it bake. So one makes the dough for a tart.

If you would bake good hollow doughnuts

Take good flour of the very best and pour on it one third quart of cream and beat eggs into it, six, seven, eight, according to how much you will make, and knead the dough as carefully as possible and roll it out very thin. Afterwards fry them, then from the inside they will rise like tiny pillows, then they are ready.

The German version of the Cookbook of Sabina Welserin is HERE.

An English transcription can be found HERE.

Monday’s Story …

Maundy Money, Maundy Food.

This Day, Last Year...

France bans absinthe.

Quotation for the Day …

I detest ... anything over-cooked, over-herbed, over-sauced, over elaborate. Nothing can go very far wrong at table as long as there is honest bread, butter, olive oil, a generous spirit, lively appetites and attention to what we are eating. Sybille Bedford.

A Lusty Tart.

Today, February 14th ...

On this St Valentine’s day, for your reading (if not eating) pleasure, I give you a 16th century take on aphrodisiac food. You may have a little trouble getting one of the ingredients for this recipe, but I am sure we can leave it out without losing too much of the effect.

A Tarte to provoke courage in a man or Woman.
Take a quart of good wine, and boyle therein two Burre rootes scraped cleane, two good Quinces, and a Potato roote well pared, and an ounce of Dates, and when all these are boyled verie tender, let them be drawne through a strainer wine and all, and then put in the yolks of eight Egs, and the braines of three or four cocke Sparrowes, and straine them into the other, and a little Rosewater, and seeth them all with Sugar, Sinamen and Ginger, and cloves and Mace, and put in a little Sweet Butter, and set it upon a chafing dish of coales betweene two platters and so let it boyle till it be something big.
[From : “A good huswifes handmaide for the kitchin Containing manie principall pointes of cookerie …”; 1594]

There is so much of interest here, I hardly know where to start. The beginning usually being a good place, I will start with the background: the mediaeval theory-of-everything. It was believed at that time that everything single thing in the natural world arose from the four basic elements (fire, earth, water, air), each of which had a particular quality (hot, dry, moist, cold). In the human body these were represented by the ‘humours’ (sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic, melancholic). Disease was due to imbalance in these humours, and health and mood could be adjusted by varying the diet, so long as you knew the ‘temperament’ of each food. So - any physician (or decent cook) would have understood the potential effect of any dish by considering the ingredient list.

Before we get to the ingredients for this recipe, let us consider the title. Why ‘courage’? Because back in the 16th century, the word also used to mean lust. So this spicy, custardy, vaguely pumpkin-pie style dish would have been expected to provoke the passion to venery, that’s why. Do you see where we are going now?

Let us take the ingredients one-by-one.

Burre (burdock) roots were a common medicinal and culinary herb with a sweet taste and mucilaginous texture – both useful features in a sweet tart. The idea that astrological influences affected the nature of a food was also taken for granted at that time, and as the burdock plant came under the influence of Venus its use to provoke ‘courage’ would have been obvious. As an added bonus, burdock also “doth wonderfully help the biting of any serpents” so it might be a handy ingredient if you are planning a romantic picnic in the country on the day.

The quince is thought by some scholars to have been the fruit that tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden, which would make sense as it probably originated in Persia. It has a wonderfully voluptuous shape and feel, and its fragrance is said to be sufficient to make a woman faint with delight into the arms of her lover. As an intriguing aside, which may or may not be relevant, marmalade was originally made from quinces – and in Elizabethan times prostitutes were called ‘marmalade madams’.

The ‘potato’ in this recipe was the sweet potato – this recipe was written a couple of centuries before the ordinary potato became a common food. Its place in this recipe can be explained by the 16th century Dr Thomas Muffet in his book “Health’s Improvement”. He says of sweet potatoes that they "nourish mightily...engendering much flesh, blood, and seed, but withal encreasing wind and lust." In other word, a perfect ingredient for an aphrodisiac dish, although one would have to worry a little about the associated ‘wind’.

Dates had also been considered an aphrodisiac and fertility symbol in the Middle East for many centuries, so their inclusion in this tart made sense even apart from the sweetness and texture that they would have added to the mixture.

Sugar was very expensive in the sixteenth century, as were the spices, so this tart was clearly only for the well-off. Human nature being what it is, obvious extravagance may have gone some of the way towards helping the aphrodisiac effect, as it perhaps does now.

Now we come to the sparrows’ brains, which are not terribly easy to source these days, and may need to be omitted in any modern rendition of the recipe. They were included on account of their astrological significance. Sparrows had been associated with the planet Venus since very ancient times, and their brains were popular ingredients in remedies to improve the generative powers.

I leave it to you, my clever readers, to ponder on the reason that the brains of male sparrows are specified in a dish intended to provoke lust, and to interpret the final mysterious instruction to ‘boyle till it be something big’.

Tomorrow’s Story …

Steak and Mustard in America.

A Previous Story for this Day …

"Saints, Sex, and Soup"

Quotation for the Day …

Clearly it is not the lovelorn sufferer who seeks solace in chocolate, but rather the chocolate-deprived individual, who, desperate, seeks in mere love a pale approximation of bittersweet euphoria. Sandra Boynton.

Maids of Honour.

Today, January 25th …

Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn were married secretly on this day in 1533 by the Bishop of Litchfield, which gives us an excuse to enjoy or discount (or both) some myths about the delicious little English almond cheesecakes known as Maids of Honour.

Various versions of the myth have Anne making the tarts for Henry (ridiculous), Henry coming across the maids eating the tarts, sampling some himself, and being so enamoured of them he decided to secure the recipe (or the maid who invented them) and lock it (her) away (ludicrous), or Henry himself discovering the recipe in a locked trunk (plain silly). So, is there a connection at all?

Well, Anne came to Henry’s attention because she was a Maid of Honour to the wife he wanted to rid himself of (Catherine of Aragon) due to her failure to produce a viable heir. That’s it, the sum total of the connection. Why Anne? Why not some other Maid of Honour to some other Queen, or some other Maid of Honour and some other Queen’s Husband? Or is there another explanation altogether?

Maid-of-Honour tarts are also sometimes called Richmond Tarts. In the borough of Richmond in London, there is a little street called Maid-of-Honour Row which was built to house the Maids of Honour of Caroline, the wife of George II, two centuries after Anne’s short reign. Perhaps then there is some connection between this elegant row of houses and the Tarts? Several sources say that the first recipe for Maid of Honour Tarts are to be found in late seventeenth century books, but I have been unable to find any (please let me know if you know of their whereabouts). Alan Davidson in The Oxford Companion to Food gives a reference that suggests that the first print occurrence occurred in the Public Advertiser of 1769. Hannah Glasse places them in the second course of several of her suggested menus in the 1778 edition of The Art of Cookery (but does not give a recipe with the name). So – perhaps there is a mid-eighteenth century association with this little elegant row of houses, and not the mother of Queen Elizabeth I?

We are really only discussing a name of course. Medieval cookery sources have a huge variety of custard, cheesecake and almond tarts, and many of them are similar to our Maids of Honour. Names are important however, so I give you a recipe for them from the late eighteenth century – one without almonds, just to show that nothing is certain in this cooking life.

From: The New Art of Cookery, according to the present practice…; by Richard Briggs; 1792.

Maids of Honour.
Take half a pint of sweet curds, beat them well in a marble mortar till they are as smooth as butter. Put in half a pint of cream, the yolks of four eggs, the whites of two, well beaten and strained through a sieve; a quarter of a pound of fresh butter melted, a little grated lemon-peel, and nutmeg, one ounce of candied citron shred very fine, a glass of brandy, and a spoonful of orange flower water; sweeten it to your palate with powder sugar, mix the ingredients all well together, have your patty pans very small, sprinkle on a little flour, put a thin puff-paste over them, more than half fill them, and bake them in a moderate oven.

Tomorrow’s Story …

Australian Meat, English Pie.

A Previous Story for this Day …

If you have any Scottish blood, or wish you had, today is “Burns Day”, and you may need the complete instructions as to how to celebrate it.

Quotation for the Day …

The most dangerous food is wedding cake. James Thurber

Hardy’s Ale.

Today, January 11th…

The novelist Thomas Hardy died on this day in 1928, and forty years later a commemorative ale was released in his honour in his home county of Dorset. This is a very special ale. It is matured in sherry casks for nine months, bottle fermented in individually numbered bottles, designed to be laid down for 5-25 years, and - at 12.5% ABV - decidedly not for wimps.

The ale was inspired by a passage in Hardy’s novel “The Trumpet Major”. The action of the novel occurs in the fictional county of Wessex (which is certainly Dorset), and Hardy describes the local beer as:

“……of the most beautiful colour that the eye of an artist in beer could desire; full in body, yet brisk as a volcano; piquant, yet without twang; luminous as an autumn sunset; free from streakiness of taste; but, finally, rather heady. The masses worshipped it, the minor gentry loved it more than wine, and by the most illustrious country families, it was not despised."

There were some anxious moments for beer aficionados around the world when the Eldridge-Pope brewery was sold in 1997 and it looked like the beer would not survive. There was no 2000 vintage, but happily common (and commercial, it seems) sense has returned, and the beer is once again available.

A recipe for the ale is clearly out of the question, and a recipe using it as an ingredient would clearly be sacrilege. Luckily, Dorset is also famous for its apples, and a recent competition was held to determine what would be the signature dish of the county. The local Dorset Apple Cake won, and fine recipes for it can be found on the sites belonging to my fellow-bloggers, Andrew at Spittoon Extra, and Anna at Baking for Britain.

My offering to you is a mid-Victorian apple cake from Eliza Acton’s Modern Cookery (1845), and leave it to you to decide if it is actually cake, or tart, or pie.

Apple Cake, or German Tart.
Work together with the fingers ten ounces of butter and a pound of flour, until they resemble fine crumbs of bread; throw in a small pinch of salt, and make them into a firm smooth paste with the yolks of two eggs and a spoonful or two of water. Butter thickly a plain cake tin, or pie mould; roll out the paste thin, place the mould upon it, trim a bit to its exact size, cover the bottom of the mould with this, then cut a band the height of the sides, and press it smoothly round them, joining the edge, which must be moistened with egg or water, to the bottom crust, and fasten upon them to prevent their separation, a narrow and thin band of paste, also moistened. Next, fill the mould nearly from the brim with the following marmalade, which must be quite cold when it is put in. Boil together, over a gentle fire at first, but more quickly afterwards, three pounds of good apples with fourteen ounces of pounded sugar, or of the finest Lisbon, the strained juice of a large lemon, three ounces of fresh butter, and a teaspoonful of pounded cinnamon, or the lightly grated rind of a couple of lemons. When the whole is perfectly smooth and dry, turn it into a pan to cool, and let it be quite cold before it is put into the paste. In early autumn, a larger proportion of sugar may be required, but this can be regulated by the taste. When the mould is filled, roll out the cover, lay it carefully over the marmalade that it may not touch it, and when the cake is securely closed, trim off the superfluous paste, add a little pounded sugar to the parings, spread them out very thin, and cut them into leaves to ornament the top of the cake, round which they may be placed as a sort of wreath*. Bake it for an hour in a moderately brisk oven. Take it from the mould, and should the sides be not sufficiently coloured put it back for a few minutes into the oven upon a baking tin. Lay a paper over the top, when it is of a fine light brown, to prevent its being too deeply coloured. This cake should be served hot.
Paste: flour, 1 lb.; butter, 10 oz.; yolks of eggs, 2; little water. Marmalade: apples, 3 lbs.; sugar, 14 oz. (more if needed); juice of lemon, 1; rinds of lemons, 2; butter, 3 oz.: baked, 1 hour.
*Or, instead of these, fasten on it with a little white of egg, after it is taken from the oven, some ready-baked leaves of almond-paste, either plain or coloured.

Tomorrow’s Story …

Victory Sausages.

A Previous Story for this Day …

The story on this day last year featured the explorer David Livingstone.

Quotation for the Day …

I have fed purely upon ale; I have eat my ale, drank my ale, and I always sleep upon ale. George Farquhar, Irish dramatist (1678-1707?)

The art of tarts.

Today, January 6th …

Today is Twelfth Day, or Epiphany, or Three Kings Day, whichever you prefer. It is the end of the traditional Christmas season, celebrating the day when the three Wise Men paid their visit and gave their gifts to the infant Jesus, or the last party day before starting the real work of the year, whichever you prefer. It is the day to put the ham bone in the freezer ready for winter soup, take down the tree, and have some Twelfth Cake or King Cake.

Every country with a European heritage has its version of the Twelfth Cake. It may be a special sweet bread, or a fruit cake, or a flaky pastry confection, and the symbolic associations are at least as important as the gastronomic. One more slice than the number of guests should be cut, the extra slice being “for God”, and is to be given to the first poor person who comes to the house. For purely secular luck, a tradition which has its roots in ancient pagan fertility rites says that a small item – a bean, a coin, or a tiny doll – must be hidden inside the cake, and the finder is elected king or queen for the day. This was a dubious privilege, with the winner – depending on the particular local custom – being responsible for leading the fun (usually drinking), paying the bill, performing the rituals that rid the house of evil for the forthcoming year, or hosting the Candlemas celebrations on February 2nd.

The proud domestic pastry-makers of England had a variation of the homely jam tart which allowed them to show off their skills at church socials. It was the “Epiphany Tart”, and kudos was attached to the intricacy of the pastry lattice on top of the open tart, and the number of different coloured jams which it contained. A popular design was in the form of the Star of David, which in expert hands allowed for 13 different colours, and must have looked like an edible stained-glass window.

For your pastry, try this recipe, from Charles Francatelli, chef to Queen Victoria.

Tart Paste
Spread a pound of flour on the table with a hollow in the centre; add half a pound of butter, three ounces of sugar, one egg, half an ounce of salt, and a gill of water; mix and work the paste into a smooth compact body.

On Monday: Funny fish bits.