Maids of honour

It feels like spring has taken a long time to arrive in Cumbria this year. With May Day last weekend it was time to cut some blossoming branches, fill a large le Parfait jar with water and pop the branches in, bringing a little bit of spring in to the house.

With spring arriving again it feels like its the right time to start-up Springtime again. And what better way than with a traditional May Day recipe.

Maids of honour are often associated with stories of Tudor courts, Henry VIII and of course, maids. I do not doubt that these stories may be based on grains of truth, but similar versions of this recipe were common during medieval and post-medieval times. The reason being that maids of honour are a seasonal, springtime recipe often associated with May Day. But why May Day? The obvious link is the term ‘maids’ being associated with young women and May Queens, etc. But looking at the actual recipe, the tart makes the most of new sweet milk from cows that had recently been let-out to pasture, giving another reason for their popularity on May Day.

May would have been a lean time of the year in terms of fresh fruit for cakes and puddings. Although one ingredient which was plentiful, and at its best, was milk. Many sweet  dishes were made from milk or curd cheese at this time of year in the past, so it is no surprise to find that the filling of a maid of honour is mainly curd cheese and jam (or lemon curd from fresh eggs). The combination of cheese when it’s at its best and jam from the store cupboard is not only wonderful, but also firmly rooted in the agricultural calendar of the past.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 1/4 pack of puff pastry
• 120gr cottage or curd cheese
• 20gr caster sugar
• zest from 1/2 a lemon
• 15gr ground almonds
• 1 medium egg
• a little bit of jam or lemon curd (I’ve used homemade lemon curd, blackcurrant jam and apricot jam –they all taste good!).

Method

1. Take your pastry out of the fridge to come up to room temperature.
2. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius.
3. In a bowl mix the cheese, sugar, zest, almonds and egg. Don’t worry about the lumps if you use cottage cheese, this melt when the tray goes in the oven.
4. Roll out the pastry, then using a cutter, cut out circles about 9cm. Don’t twist the cutter, just press down sharply.
5. Put the rounds in to the holes of a muffin tin.
6. Put barely half of teaspoon of jam or curd into the base of the case, followed by the cheese mixture. Do not over fill the cases.
7. Put in the oven for about 20 mins.

Victoria Sponge – how hard can it possibly be?

Sometimes there are days when everything works out, and occasionally there are days when everything goes wrong. This was one of those days – the later sort.

A box of duck eggs had been sitting on the counter for a couple of days, just asking to be used. Then I remember a comment by neighbour’s husband, ‘they make a wonderful Victoria Sponge’. After a quick phone call to my mum to get her recipe, I set about making my sponge. First problem – how many duck eggs are equal to 4 hen eggs?

Visiting my neighbour to ask her opinion resulted in me leaving with a fresh goose egg to use instead (and apparently 3 duck eggs = 4 hen eggs). Goose eggs were even more unfamiliar to me, but the prospect of cooking with one was quite exciting! Armed with the knowledge that a goose egg is equal to 3 hen eggs and the advice that I would really need to whack the shell to get it to break, I hurried back to the kitchen.

If 1 goose egg = 3 hen eggs, then by my calculations I would need a hen egg too. In my haste to get started, I mixed the beaten egg with the butter. This was the source of my second problem. I should have creamed the butter and sugar, not the egg, I must have written it down wrongly. Luckily, I saw the magimix at this stage so the egg, butter and sugar, were duly blitzed. The third problem, was slightly more serious: an absence of self-raising flour. OK, this should have been easily remedied, I just needed some plain flour and baking powder, easy when you’ve got plain flour (how could I possibly be this disorganised?). A root-around in the cupboard and I found some local stone-ground flour - great! After sifting the flour to remove some of the coarse bits and adding the baking powder, I was back on-track. Making a cake really shouldn’t have been this difficult. The mixture rose wonderfully, but then I couldn’t get the sponge out of the tins, why had I even started baking this morning? I’d greased them thoroughly, but next time I’ll use greaseproof paper in the bottom.

The stone-ground flour gave the sponge a coarser texture than usual and I felt the sponge was a little too dry and crumbly (I think I may have cooked it for a few minutes too long). The result was certainly not the prettiest of cakes I’ve ever made, but it tasted good. With the number of things which wrong, I couldn’t really have ask for anything more – especially as most of my problems were brought on by me, and me alone! (You’ll be glad to know I’ve now stocked-up on both plain and self-raising flour).

Apart from the sugar, all of the ingredients turned out to be Cumbrian: the butter and the damson cheese were bought from local producers at Damson Day, the eggs were from the hens and geese behind the house and the flour was from a local mill. This wasn’t the original aim of making the cake, but it was a wonderful side-product of my comedy of errors!

Ingredients

8oz butter (at room temperature)

8oz sugar

8oz self-raising flour

4 hen eggs (or one goose egg + one hen egg)

2oz butter (at room temperature)

4oz icing sugar

a few tbsp of jam

Method (this is what I should have done – thanks mum!)

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
2. Cream the butter and sugar together, add half the egg and a tablespoon of flour.
3. Then fold in the flour, this is important as it keeps the sponge fluffy.
4. Split the mixture between two sponge tins (lined with greaseproof paper) and put in the oven until risen and firm to touch, about 20-25 mins.
5. Turn out onto a wire rack and allow to cool.
6. Make the butter icing by mixing the remaining butter and the icing sugar.
7. Smooth the butter icing onto one half of the sponge, spread the jam on top of the icing, and then place the second half of the sponge on top. Dust with a pinch of icing sugar.
8. Enjoy with a cup of tea.

In the bag…Bacon, Leek and Cheese Tart

This is a very, very late entry to the ‘In the Bag’ event hosted by ‘A Slice of Cherry Pie’ and ‘A Real Epicurean’, but when I made this tart this morning, I couldn’t resist!!

My partner got back yesterday from a week skiing in France (lucky thing!), and returned with a ton of cheese in his suitcase! So, combining some of the cheese with the bacon and leeks I picked up from the farmer’s market yesterday, I  made one of my favourite lunchtime tarts…

We took this to the beach and had a wonderful picnic in the sunshine. It feels very strange, but very nice, to actually have my weekends back!

Bacon, Leek and Cheese Tart

Ingredients:

250gr puff pastry

120gr leeks (cut into sticks)

60gr butter

130gr bacon (chopped into 1cm squares)

60gr cheese (grated), I used Beaufort, but Gruyere or anything else that needs using-up is fine!

2 eggs

100ml double cream

A pinch of dried thyme

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees celsius.
2. Spray or wipe a loose-bottomed flan tin with oil.
3. Roll out the pastry and place in the tin. Put some greaseproof paper on top, followed by some baking beans. Place in the oven for 20 mins.
4. Meanwhile, melt the butter in a frying pan over a medium heat. Add the leeks and cook for about 15 mins.
5. When the leeks are soft, remove from the pan and drain on kitchen-paper. Add the bacon to the same pan, turn-up the heat and fry for about 5 mins until crispy.
6. Mix the eggs with the cream, thyme and some salt and pepper.
7. After removing the greaseproof pastry and beans from the pastry case add the leeks and bacon.
8. Pour over the egg mixture and top with the cheese.
9. Place in the oven for 20 mins, or until the tart is set.

Bits ‘n’ Pieces – chicken stock, egg shells and seeds

My breaks today have been spent sorting out.

Chicken Stock

The other day we treated ourselves to a wonderful, organic, free-range chicken from a local estate. It was fabulous, so succulent! Today’s primary job has been simple: to make stock with the leftovers.

I’ve been left with a car without a current tax disc (as mine has gone on a jaunt to York) so I’ve been rather restricted to the house for the last few days and unable to get any extra ingredients.

Therefore, working on the principle that you only really need: a chicken carcass, some water (about 2 litres) and some veg (preferably so-called ‘white’ veg), I embarked on my stock-making during one of today’s breaks. To the pot with the water and chicken I added:

• Two rather past-it parsnips
• A floppy carrot
• Some left-over leek tops
• A red onion (no white ones left)
• A couple of bay leaves
• A good grind of coarsely-ground black pepper.

Next, I spent most of the two-hour cooking time making sure that the cat didn’t attack the protruding bits of carcass…

Result: just over 0.5 litre of yummy stock. I feel I should have a bit more, but with a hob with almost non-existent temperature control (barely simmer or raging boil) I can’t be too disappointed.

Egg Shells

Next, I seem to have had a large collection of egg shells building up. They were duly put in the oven to be baked (100 degrees for an hour or so), crushed and stored.

I plan to use them as an anti-slug repellent for my lettuces. It’s a tip I saw somewhere, and I can’t remember where, but ‘thank you’ to whoever suggested it!

…and seeds

Lastly, while I was washing-up I was mentally planning an email to send to the seed company who I placed an order with over a week ago. There was something in their confirmation email which said “All goods will be despatched to arrive in good time for planting”. This year or next? The word impatient comes to mind again…

…but then a knock on the door revealed the postman, not an unusual occurrence, but he was clutching two small packages! I’m yet to open them but they bear the name of the seed supplier on them! You can guess what tomorrow’s breaks will be spent doing.