Shrewsbury Cakes

This recipe can be found on page eight of Harriet’s recipe book, from 1902 or 1903. Before I say anything else, I am pleased to announce that they were delicious! Those of you who have followed this blog for a while will know that Harriet’s recipes have a tendency to turn out inedible – from the teeth-shattering Ginger Bread to the burnt mess of Lemon Cheesecakes. So, it was nice to finally cook something as moreish as these cakes. Although now we’re on the subject of form, aren’t they biscuits?…

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Ginger Bread

This recipe is from pages six to seven of Harriet’s book. This is the third gingerbread recipe I have posted so far (if you include Parkin, which I do). It seems that, if they were united by little else, both Lancastrians and Yorkshire folk did love their gingerbread. I’ll be honest from the start though: it wasn’t nice. It has become a running theme of this blog that Harriet’s recipes do not always please modern tastes. Previously, I’ve speculated that perhaps she was learning to cook from relatives that were used to ‘making do’, as many of them had experienced acute poverty in their lives. Harriet did not have an easy start in life, as this post will sadly expand upon.

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Corn Flour Cake

This recipe is from Harriet’s book, on page six. The photograph above, terrible as it is, fully does justice to the dry and inedible quality of this cake. At least, unlike Harriet’s Sponge Cake, this does have some fat in it but it only makes for a marginal improvement in taste and texture.

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Parkin

Strictly speaking, it should be the turn of Maimie’s book this week but, given that it’s the first week of November, it seemed only right to make Parkin. Traditionally a Yorkshire delicacy (although Lancashire and other Midlands and Northern counties make a version too), I turned to Harriet’s book and skipped a few pages to find her first Parkin recipe (oh yes, there’s more than one!)

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Pound Cake

This recipe is on page three of Harriet’s recipe book. It’s interesting that, so far, Harriet’s book has provided only sweet recipes, for cakes, buns and tea-cakes. Perhaps she was watching the cook that she worked alongside in the vicarage, as she provided afternoon tea for the vicar, his daughters and parishioners. Or, as I speculated in a previous post, her grandmother Ann could have been teaching her to cook – and we all know what a sweet tooth grandmothers tend to have (or perhaps that was just mine!)

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Sponge Cake

Anyone who has been reading this blog so far will know that Harriet’s recipes are known for their brevity and this one doesn’t disappoint. Crammed on to the bottom of a page, it’s little more than a list of ingredients, although it is pleasingly splattered and singed, as if it’s been consulted many times.

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Queen Cakes

In my last post about Harriet, she was working as a servant to a vicar in rural Yorkshire. This recipe follows the pattern set by her previous ones: scribbled, abbreviated, difficult to read. The instructions she gives are brief and, despite her notebook being small, she manages to cram three recipes on to one page.

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Excellent Gingerbread

This is the first recipe in Althea’s recipe book, stuck on the opposite page to the first, proper hand-written page. Underneath it, Althea has written her name ‘Althea N. Harrison‘ and the date ‘November 20th 1866.’ On the inside cover, in faint pencil, someone (probably her husband, James, after he was widowed) has written ‘Dear Althea’s Recipe Book‘ and ‘Catherine Street. 20th November 1866.’ The recipe is a newspaper cutting, and the only recipe in the book that is not hand-written.

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