Category: Baking and Cooking

Literary Foods: Beatrix Potter’s Roasted Apples

On By CandaceIn Baking and Cooking, Creativity and Inspiration, On Being a Writer, Thoughts and LifeLeave a comment

I have adored Beatrix Potter’s little stories since I was very young. One of my very first memories is of my dad sitting me on his knee and reading me the “Tale of Mr. Jeremy Fisher”. I remember asking for it to be read to me again and again and shivering when the unique frog food of “grasshopper with lady bird sauce” was mentioned at the end.

Beatrix Potter--leads to a nice 5 min videoBeatrix’s little books are full of references to food. From the Roly-Poly Pudding to Peter’s feast in Mr. Gregory’s garden all the way to a mouse size banquet in the Tale of Mrs. Tittlemouse and Ginger and Pickles wonderful store with mentions of sugar, peppermints, cream biscuits and water crackers. Almost all of Beatrix’s books include some reference to food or at least to the classic English custom of teatime.
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Literary Foods: Little Women and a Civil War Treat

On By CandaceIn Baking and Cooking, Creativity and Inspiration, On Being a Writer, Thoughts and Life4 Comments

Little Women has been one of my most favorite books since I was a teenager. Surprisingly, I didn’t read the whole book through until I was around 15 or 16, but the movie has always been one of my go-to comfort films. Probably because it was one of the very first period drama movies I watched and actually enjoyed. 🙂

When I was thinking about a recipe to try that reminded me of Little Women, I was inspired by the short passage from the book about the Christmas breakfast that the March sisters so willingly give up to others.

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Literary Foods: Little House Apple Turnovers

On By CandaceIn Baking and Cooking, Creativity and Inspiration, On Being a Writer, Thoughts and LifeLeave a comment

Some of my favorite books will forever be the Little House books. I remember the first time I read them being utterly taken with the amazing descriptions Laura Ingalls wrote of her pioneer life. And though they were written as fiction, the stories were true! I still love to take out my battered copies of the books every once in a while and peruse the well loved pages.


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Literary Foods: Jane Austen and an English Tea

On By CandaceIn Baking and Cooking, Creativity and Inspiration, On Being a Writer, Thoughts and Life2 Comments

If there is one author I have read who I would love to go back in time and have tea with, it would be Jane Austen!

Tea features so prominently in her books that it is not hard to imagine the author herself sitting with a cup as she penned her novels! If she wasn’t sipping while she wrote, I am sure the kettle was always sitting ready on the parlor hearth.

Jane Austen and her family were not extremely wealthy like some of the characters she writes about, but her family always had a constant supply of good tea from one of the best tea merchants in London, Twinings. Since Jane was in charge of making her family’s breakfast every morning, she also kept the keys to the tea chest and the sugar in her charge. I am sure she knew just how to make the perfect, proper cup to go along with the toast and muffins!

I recently came across this fascinating book  about the history of tea in Jane’s day and highly recommend it! If you have ever been interested in the importance of tea in Regency England, and particularly Jane Austen and her family, you will greatly enjoy it!

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Literary Foods: A Cottage Picnic on the Moors

On By CandaceIn Baking and Cooking, Creativity and Inspiration, On Being a Writer, Thoughts and LifeLeave a comment

literary-foods_-currant-buns

“From that time the exercises were part of the day’s duties as much as the Magic was. It became possible for both Colin and Mary to do more of them each time they tried, and such appetites were the results that but for the basket Dickon put down behind the bush each morning when he arrived they would have been lost.

A Childhood Classic That Should Be Read Again and Again | Off the Shelf:

But the little oven in the hollow and Mrs. Sowerby’s bounties were so satisfying that Mrs. Medlock and the nurse and Dr. Craven became mystified again. You can trifle with your breakfast and seem to disdain your dinner if you are full to the brim with roasted eggs and potatoes and richly frothed new milk and oat-cakes and buns and heather honey and clotted cream.”
The Secret Garden, Chapter 24

 

I don’t know about you, but roasted potatoes with butter, oat-cakes and buns with clotted cream and honey and with milk to drink sounds like a wonderful picnic to me! Perhaps a breakfast picnic. Especially on the windswept, foggy moors of an English manor house.

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The Writer’s Tea Chest

On By CandaceIn Baking and Cooking, On Being a Writer, Thoughts and Life1 Comment

Writers and tea go together like bread and butter. Or maybe cream and sugar?

Famous authors down through the ages have had their favorite drink to keep their imaginations fueled as they wrote. Everything from beer and wine, to lemonade and cocktails found their into the heart of writers and sometimes into their writing.

beautiful blue and white china still life by: Linda Yvonne:

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Literary Foods: Lembas

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Lembas

“In the morning, as they were beginning to pack their slender goods, Elves that could speak their tongue came to them and brought them many gifts of food and clothing for the journey. The food was mostly in the form of very thin cakes, made of a meal that was baked a light brown on the outside, and inside was the colour of cream. Gimli took up one of the cakes and looked at it with a doubtful eye.
“Cram,” he said under his breath, as he broke off a crisp corner and nibbled it. His expression quickly changed, and he ate all the rest of the cake with relish.
“No more, no more!” cried the Elves, laughing. “You have eaten enough already for a long days march.”
“I though it was a kind of cram, such as the Dale-men make for journeys in the wild,” said the Dwarf.
“So it is,” they answered, “But we call it lembas or waybread….”
The Fellowship of the Ring, Book II

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