Tags
books, Deirdre Le Faye, food, Jane Austen, JASNA Nova Scotia, literature, Maggie Black, tea, The Jane Austen Cookbook
The next JASNA Nova Scotia meeting will be on Sunday, November 9th, at 2 p.m., when we’ll meet in Halifax for tea, a short business meeting, and conversations about the 2014 JASNA AGM in Montreal. Please let Anne, our Regional Coordinator, know if you’re interested, or tell me (either by email – semsley at gmail dot com – or by leaving a comment here) and we’ll give you details about the location.
I’ve been rereading The Jane Austen Cookbook, by Maggie Black and Deirdre Le Faye, and I’m trying to decide whether to make “Mrs. Perrot’s Heart or Pound Cake” (“If you chuse Currants ¾ of a pound well washd & pick’d to be strew’d over them just as they are put into your Tins”), “Martha’s Gingerbread ‘Cakes’” (which we’d call biscuits or cookies, made with black treacle, or molasses), or “Ratafia Cakes” (ground almonds, egg whites, sugar, and orange liqueur).
Vote for your favourite in the comments below – even if you won’t be in Halifax on November 9th – and I’ll (attempt to!) make whichever recipe wins the popular vote.
Sarah Emsley 
Hi Sarah, I vote for the Ratafia Cakes! I wish I could attend the tea and hear the talk about the AGM — and indulge in the goodies that you all prepare. Have a great meeting. Thanks for the always interesting posts.
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Thanks, Sandra! I wish you could join us, too. Perhaps for the birthday lunch in December? Blog post with details coming soon.
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Gingerbread cakes! Especially if you could get real treacle instead of having to use molasses. Of course, I’m sure that’s a little hard to come by. I remember eating treacle toffee as a child… oh, where did that come from? How did I get to be someone who wanders off into childhood reminiscences? Anyway – gingerbread cakes, please! Ah, if only I could join you. Being a full continent away makes it rather a long trip.
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Thank you for sharing that childhood memory! I’ve never had treacle toffee — sounds lovely. Too bad about the distance.
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My vote is for ratafia cakes, as well. Though I was intrigued with the instructions for the pound cakes and the subtle technique implied with the currants ‘to be strew’d’ …😊 wish I could attend!
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Yes, I liked that term, too. If I make that cake I’ll have to be very careful to strew the currants instead of just sprinkling them on top of the batter.
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Please make the ratafia cakes. I have never tasted them but I just love the sound of the word.
Christina
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It is a lovely word, isn’t it? One of the reasons I was drawn to that recipe. Also — the short list of ingredients.
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Ratafias please Sarah. And please save me a sample as I will be in concert elsewhere during the meeting on November 9th.
Plus here’s a tho’t for the business/planning part of the meeting. How about we hold a do-it-ourselves, prepared-on-site collation from The Jane Austen Cookbook?
By the way, treacle or molasses – is there a difference? I became familiar with the word “treacle” as I grew up though we never used it. There are grades of treacle, I believe, “black treacle” being the darkest, rawest and least refined. My Mother always cooked with Tate & Lyle’s Golden Syrup, a much more refined and sweeter product. I met “molasses” in North America and assumed it was the same as “treacle”.
Well, it is a substitute but apparently there is a difference. According to the OED:
“In technical language, molasses is applied to the drainings of raw sugar and treacle to the syrup from sugar in the process of refining.” This is supplied courtesy of the blog at: http://historiccookery.com/2011/01/27/treacle.
Anyway I’ll happily consume molasses cookies, treacle tarts, whatever.
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I don’t think I’ve ever had treacle — I wonder if it’s available at Pete’s. So far, however, ratafia cakes are in the lead, so I might be shopping for ground almonds and orange liqueur instead. I’m happy to save you a sample of whatever I make.
A JASNA NS meeting with food from the JA Cookbook sounds great. Do you mean we’d all make one recipe together at the meeting, or we’d bring a variety of things made at home?
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I was thinking we might make a variety of items, probably planned in advance, at the meeting and then try them. Bake and consume together of an afternoon. With tea (in slipdishes?) of course. And one of our members has a super syllibub recipe, remember?
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Ratafia cakes sound delish!
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Thank you, Sandra! I wish you could be here to try them. Doesn’t look as if anyone’s going to vote for pound cake….
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