It’s funny to think that the first documented instance of figure-shaped gingerbread biscuit was at the court of Elizabeth I of England. She had the gingerbread figures made and presented in the likeness of some of her important guests which brought the human shape of the gingerbread cookies into popularity. Read more here.
Christmas is never Christmas without gingerbread people or houses! I’ve come across several recipes for ‘Gingerbread Men’ from around the 1940s, some using Golden Syrup (UK), some using Molasses or Corn Syrup (North America). Some contain an egg, others don’t.
Below is my favourite recipe in which I make one adaption to improve the binding and holding together of the gingerbread. It tastes absolutely lovely, is firm enough to also make slabs for gingerbread houses, we may do that next year!
I’d like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and really hope and wish that 2022 will be a year that sees you in good health and experience much happiness.
C xxxx
Ingredients
350g plain flour
140g of butter or margarine
100g dark brown sugar
3tbsp golden syrup (or molasses)
1tbsp ground flaxseed (mix with 2.5 tablespoons of hot water, it helps hold the mixture together when baking)
1 tbsp ground ginger
2tsp ground cinnamon
1tsp bicarbonate of soda
pinch of salt
Method
Mix the flaxseed with 2.5 tablespoons of hot water. Mix well and set aside to thicken.
Melt butter, sugar and golden syrup in a pan on a low heat stirring slowly until all runny and melted. Set this aside in a mixing bowl to cool down a bit.
Stir in the flaxseed mixture thoroughly.
Add in the sieved flour, bicarbonate of soda, pinch of salt and all the spices and mix until a smooth dough is formed.
Wrap or place in container and chill in fridge for 30 minutes.
Heat oven to 180C
Roll the dough out onto a lightly floured surface to about 0.5cm and start stamping out the gingerbread.
Place on parchment paper on a baking tray.
Cook for about 15 minutes (slightly more or less according to your oven)
Remove from oven when cooked. Leave on sheet to cool down for 15 minutes then transfer to a cooling rack. Once fully cold then you can keep in an airtight container for about a week or so.
Decorate with icing sugar when fully cold. If no icing sugar available dent the dough before cooking to form eyes, mouth and buttons! Or just decorate with anything you’ve got!
Last month I watched a wonderful film called “The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society” and absolutely loved it. I loved it even more when 20 minutes into the movie a strange wartime dish called ‘Potato Peel Pie’ made an appearance, a insipid looking creation facilitating the gag reflex of all uninitiated humans who tasted it. That was enough for me to want to re-create it. Surely it couldn’t have been THAT bad?
Traditional Guernsey Potato Peel Pie was made of 3 ingredients, potatoes, beetroot and milk. With little flour or butter available to the islanders during German occupation, the potato peelings were used to create an open pie crust of sorts instead, into which mashed potato and chopped beetroot was added and then baked in the oven. I absolutely love potatoes but even I could see that without a few extras here and there and even with copious amounts of salt and pepper, this dish was going to be bland without some artistic licence!
I simply added some chopped spring onion (although leeks would have been good to use too) and some margarine to facilitate a pleasing taste. The ‘Potato Peel Pie’ was very tasty, I didn’t skimp on the salt and pepper because without these it would have indeed been very bland.
Here is the recipe for the authentic WW2 “Guernsey Potato Peel Pie” with my additions noted.
WW2 Guernsey Potato Peel Pie
Ingredients:
2 large potatoes
Dash of milk
Beetroot
Salt & pepper
(I also added spring onion and margarine)
Method:
Wash your two large potatoes and peel the potatoes
Par-boil the potato skins for 3-5 minutes
Drain and set aside
Grease a two person size pie dish
Place the potato peels on the bottom and around the sides
Dot in some margarine
Press the peels down a little to the bottom and sides and sprinkle with salt
Dice up some slices of beetroot (I used some pickled beetroot) and dot around the base
Place pie dish in a pre-heated oven at 220C until the potato peels are properly cooked and the edges are browning
Cut your remaining peeled potatoes into chunks and boil until cooked.
Drain and set aside.
Cut up onions or leeks and fry until cooked in a pan
Add in the cooked potato chunks and mash adding in milk where needed and lots of salt and pepper
Place the mash into the potato peel pie crust
Sprinkle with salt and pepper and continue baking in the oven until the top is lightly crisped.
Who doesn’t like that beautiful deep burgundy and earthy beauty of beetroot? It is, of course, just wonderful baked and eaten straight from the oven with just salt and pepper BUT it also takes on quite a different taste and usefulness when pickled for further use throughout the year. I particularly love my pickled beetroot preserved with juniper berries which somehow remind me of fragrant evergreen forests, certainly evocative of the wild. I like that..
It really is so simple to pickle beetroot and if you don’t want to go to the extra faff of processing the filled jars in a hot water bath at the end (so you can store them for several months in your larder) then you can always place the jars in your fridge instead and just make sure to use them up within a few weeks.
Once you bake your beetroot save the juice that is in the tin foil, once strained you can store it in the fridge for a few days and use it as a food dye for cakes.
Enjoy!
C xxxxx
Ingredients
Several large beetroots, 12 medium or 20+ tiny ones
Gently wash beetroots and cut some of the stalks and tails off but leave an inch or so of the top and bottom on so they bleed less when cooking
Place all in a couple of large pieces of tin foil brought together at the top or individually wrap.
Cook in oven at about 180 C for an hour. Tiny ones less, large ones longer. Bake until tender.
20 minutes before the beetroot has cooked place clean washed jars into the oven to sterilise for about 20 minutes.
You will also need to bring a large deep saucepan of water to a simmer as you will need to process the jars of beetroot after they have been bottled (not everyone does this but for safety I do as it ensures a good vacuum and seal)
Remove from oven and when cool enough to handle place in water and removed the skin and top and tail. If cooked properly the skin will easily peel away. Rinse and place on non-porous plate or tray.
Cut into chunks for the medium or large beetroots, tiny ones can be pickled whole.
In a saucepan place the vinegar, water, sugar, salt, peppercorns and juniper berries (and mustard seeds if you like those)
Stir and bring to a simmer until all the sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat.
Remove jars from oven, fill jars with beetroot leaving 1/2 inch headroom, (add a bay leaf if you like) pour on hot liquid from saucepan.
Clean jar rims with vinegar then put lids onto hot jars and liquid, finger tight.
Place in hot water (covered by water) and simmer for about 20 minutes.
Remove safely with jar lifter.
Set aside and leave undisturbed so the jars create a vacuum and the lid depresses. Several hours later you can move the jar.
This jam was just lovely! I used the recipe from one of the Ministry of Foods ‘Jams and Jellies’ leaflets (see below) substituting elderberries for blackcurrants (as I had a couple of bags in my freezer). I have 3 jams on the go right now, plain blackcurrant, this blackcurrant and apple and a rhubarb, apple and berry (recipe coming soon). I’m particularly enjoying a teaspoonful in my morning porridge or a dollop on my fresh homemade bread 2 or 3 times a week.
I sterilise my jars for these jam recipes by washing the jars, rinsing in hot water and then placing the empty jars in a pre-heated oven at 150C for 20 minutes, removing them on the tray moments before ladling in the hot jam. The lids I rinse, place in a bowl, pour over very hot water from the kettle until the lids are submerged, and leave them there for several minutes before the jam is added to the jars.
1.5 lbs Blackcurrantswashed & drained (frozen berries are fine)
1.5 lbsBramley applespeeled, cored and cut into 1/2 inch sized chunks
2.5 lbs Granulated sugar (maybe only 2lbs of sugar if using sweet apples)
300mlWater
Instructions
Put the water and apple chunks in a preserving pan (or similar) and simmer gently, stirring slowly until soft (about 5-10 mins).
Add the blackcurrants, bring to the boil and simmer, stirring slowly until soft (about 5-10 mins).
Add the sugar and keep stirring to dissolve the crystals.
Once dissolved boil rapidly for 10 mins stirring regularly.
Take off the heat and test a large drop of jam on a chilled saucer and if it crinkles after a couple of mins it’s ready (alternatively use a jam/candy thermometer until it reaches 105C)
If not boil for another 2 mins and repeat the test until ready.
Remove excess scum with a slotted spoon.
Ladle into sterilised jars. Makes several x 300 ml jars
Caveat: You can further process the jams after bottling (submerged in hot water and simmered for a further 15 minutes for a jars up to 500mls and 25 minutes up to 750 mls). This is often used to ensure a proper seal/vacuum once removed from the hot water. Although I usually further process with pickles etc I don’t always with high sugar jams as long as everything is clean and piping hot and the rims of the jar are absolutely clean when placing the lids on. Although botulism is quite rare these days you can’t be too clean and too careful so feel free to process further… xx
BOOK UPDATE: “The Pandemic Pantry cookbook is about half completed now. It is taking longer than I thought mostly because I’ve been using the nice weather to work in the garden to try and prepare for planting a victory garden. With no job and an uncertain future right now I HAD to put this first and make it a priority knowing that the nice weather wouldn’t be with us forever (we are forecast nearly two weeks of rain starting tomorrow). I feel that our food supply is important especially if prices rise over the coming months and hopefully, a garden of sorts will help my economic situation a little if times get tough…. hope you understand. I’ll be catching up with the book this week. Thanks for all the great recipes and messages. It’s been AMAZING!” C xxxx
Bread and Butter Pickles really are one of those synonymous Great Depression recipes. The origins are likely from the 1920s, a few years before the crash and subsequent depression.
QUOTE:Bread-and-butter pickles are a marinated pickle produced with sliced cucumbers in a solution of vinegar, sugar, and spices which may be processed either by canning or simply chilled as refrigerator pickles. The origin of the name and the spread of their popularity in the United States is attributed to Omar and Cora Fanning, a pair of Illinois cucumber farmers who started selling sweet and sour pickles in the 1920s and filed for the trademark “Fanning’s Bread and Butter Pickles” in 1923 (though the recipe and similar ones are probably much older).[3] The story attached to the name is that the Fannings survived rough years by making the pickles with their surplus of undersized cucumbers and bartering them with their grocer for staples such as bread and butter.[4]
It makes sense that after a plentiful harvest and a glut of cheap vegetables available in stores/markets, people started preserving without the need for refrigeration for leaner months during the winter and of course, this behaviour came into its own during the Great Depression and WW2 (however home canning dated back into the 1800’s). When nothing much else was available, some salty and sweet pickles sandwiched between bread and butter was much welcomed and enjoyed.
Bread and Butter Pickles were in many recipe books in North America during WW2. I have a strong nostalgia for these pickles as when I lived in Canada, a small group of volunteers would congregate in the Lions Club community kitchen in Mahone Bay to make hundreds of pickles and jams to fundraise for the Mahone Bay Settler’s Museum. I loved the times I helped out with this amazing bunch of women and the smell of processing Bread & Butter Pickles still remains with me.
So I HAD to include them on my blog, they are absolutely worthy. I have just eaten a bread and butter sandwich filled with the pickles and it was delicious.
The original recipe was said to contain just cucumbers, onions and green peppers as the main vegetables. The recipe has changed in the last 100 years but the one below I have based on a handwritten note I found online from someone’s Grandma during WW2 in North America.
Ingredients
8/10 small firm cucumbers (or 4/5 large firm cucumbers)
4 cups of white vinegar
2 cups of sugar ( you can use a little less)
1/2 cup water
4 tablespoons of kosher or pickling salt
1 large mild onion
1 green pepper
1 red pepper
1 tablespoon of mustard seeds
2 teaspoons mixed or black peppercorn
1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/2 teaspoon celery seeds (I didn’t use as I had none)
1/8 teaspoon of ground cloves (I didn’t use as I don’t like cloves)
Method
Chop the cucumbers into 1cm or 1/4 inch slices after having removed and discarded both ends.
Chop the peppers into long slices
Chop the onions into very thin half-round slices
In a large bowl mix the chopped vegetables above with the kosher or pickling salt (table salt will make the pickling brine cloudy)
When all the vegetables have been mixed thoroughly, cover with some cling film in contact along the top and place on a cold shelf in your fridge for 2-4 hours so the liquid will leach from the vegetables making them crispier for pickling.
After 2-4 hours you need to thoroughly rinse the vegetables several times in copious amounts of cold running water to remove as much salt as possible. Set aside to drain while you make your pickling brine.
Get a large stockpot and fill with water, enough to cover the jars you will be using for the pickles as you’ll need to place the jars in once you have filled them. Bring to the boil. You can boil your empty jars in this for 5 minutes before filling or alternatively rinse the clean jars and place on a tray in a preheated oven (160 C) for 15 minutes until hot. You should always ensure that your jars are hot when you add in hot liquids.
Place jar lids in a bowl of boiling water ensuring they are covered. Set aside.
In a large saucepan put in your vinegar, water, sugar, mustard seeds, peppercorns, ground turmeric, celery seeds and ground cloves (if used).
Bring to a very gentle simmer, stirring to dissolve the sugar and ensure everything is well mixed in.
Fill each jar with a mixture of the vegetables.
Add in the hot brine leaving a head-space of about 1/2 inch to allow for expansion during the processing in hot water.
Clean top of each rim of the jars with some kitchen roll and white vinegar.
Place lids on jars, finger tight. Do not over tighten however they should be firmly on.
Place jars into stock-pot (not directly onto the bottom, you can stand them on a silicon muffin tray or place a damp tea towel in the bottom of the pot).
Simmer for 15 minutes for 500 ml or less jars and longer (about 25 minutes) for 1 litre jars.
Remove from pot with a jar lifter and place on a tea towel and leave undisturbed for a couple of hours. The lids will depress and form a safe seal.
Once cooled, clean up the outside of the jar, label and place somewhere out of direct sunlight for storage.
Leave pickles for at least a week although I opened up a small pot the day after pickling and they tasted great!
This is such a simple wartime recipe for a small quantity of delicious, velvety, deep-purple, mouthwatering blackcurrant jam. You HAVE to try it and so crazy-easy to attempt for your first go at making jam!
Fresh blackcurrants are preferable but to make it even easier I made this small-batch from frozen fruit perfectly! (In fact DON’T WAIT for fresh berries to come into the shops. It might be wise to buy some bags of frozen berries. Our British fruit pickers (over 90%) come from Eastern Europe each year performing vital services to our fruit harvesting industry. With our current ‘Coronavirus Pandemic’ situation, our normal guaranteed and reliable agricultural workers from overseas may be restricted from their normal annual travel to the UK which could be devastating for UK farmers if they cannot recruit enough British workers.)
Next time I go shopping (trying to restrict it to a maximum of once or twice a week for fresh produce), I’ll certainly be buying myself a bag or two of more frozen berries while they are available.
I enjoyed two slices of bread I made yesterday slathered in this ‘juicy assed jam’ with a nice cuppa tea and I recommend you do exactly the same.
It will make you smile.
Take care, stay safe, stay home
C xxxx
Blackcurrant Jam (makes 3 x 1 lb pots)
Ingredients
4 cups of frozen berries
3 cups of sugar
1/2 lemon squeezed (not vital)
1 teaspoon of pectin (not vital but I always add to all jams I make)
Clean jam jars (rinse, heat in oven at 140C for 15 minutes)
Clean lids (rinse, place in a small bowl, cover with hot pre-boiled water until ready to seal jars)
Method
Put the 4 cups of frozen berries in a large thick-bottomed saucepan and put onto a medium heat.
Stir until berries are defrosted and simmering gently (about 5 mins). Remove from heat.
Mash with a potato masher a little so some of the berries burst to the consistency you like.
Mix the sugar and pectin and add to the berry mix and stir until all mixed together.
Add in the 1/2 squeezed lemon.
Return to medium heat and keep stirring slowly adjusting the heat so as not to burn.
You need to bring the mixture to a rolling boil, stirring all the time and maintain this for about 10 minutes until the setting point has been reached (105 C or 220 F). If you don’t have a thermometer drop 1/2 teaspoon onto a cold plate and if after a minute it thickens and becomes fairly firm instead of liquid then it has reached the setting point.
Once the correct temperature has been reached, keep stirring and give the mixture another minute.
Remove from heat and stir again.
Remove hot jars from oven (see above)
Using a ladle and funnel, add the hot jam mixture to the hot jars and twist on the clean hot lids.
Set aside, the jar will be hot and will take at least a few hours to cool.
Jam is ready to use once it has totally cooled down and unopened will keep for a year or two.
People have asked me where I have been getting my cute jars and labels. The links are below:
JARS:24 jam/chutney jars with gingham printed lids
As easy, quick, convenience foods are rapidly flying off our supermarket shelves at an extraordinary speed in recent days during the ‘Coronavirus Global Pandemic’, NOW is a good time to perhaps turn to simple foods from yesteryear to create nourishing meals for ourselves and loved ones with ingredients that still appear to be more readily available.
I’ve selected several of my re-created authentic wartime recipes below that fill tummies, are surprisingly delicious, and simple to make. Many of them use porridge oats, dried lentils, root vegetables, butter/margarine, basic fruit and flour. Add herbs, salt and spices to your own personal taste!
And if we at some stage, can’t get bananas, for a bit of fun I’ve included a video recipe to make yourself some ‘mock banana’ sandwiches out of parsnips.
Keep calm, keep your spirits up and let’s keep carrying on!
Much love,
C xxxx
PS: Check out my links to some prepping and self-sufficiency websites and YouTube channels at the bottom of the page!
Apple and Rhubarb Crumble
It’s been forever since I’ve baked a proper British pudding and every spoonful that entered my mouth was accompanied by sounds of wanton desire that were slightly obscene. There is something wrong with a pudding if it’s consumer doesn’t groan a little…
Here is the authentic WW2 recipe. Enjoy and groan a little yourself… Click here!
Marrow and Lentil Stew
Just to clarify a question that has been popping up on Facebook and Instagram… a marrow in the UK is pretty much an overgrown courgette (zucchini) and not bone marrow (but I can understand the confusion there for sure!). You can use courgettes for this recipe too!
So far out of 1 marrow I have created 3 large portions of ‘Marrow Masala’ (not a 1940’s recipe), a ‘Courgette Cake’ (not a 1940’s recipe), 3 large jars of ‘Marrow Chutney’ and today a ‘Marrow and Lentil Stew’. The stew today was delicious!
Potato Salad with Dutch Sauce
Curious as to what (during rationing in WW2) people slathered their spuds in, I delved into ‘Feeding the Nation’ by Marguerite Patten OBE. Heinz Salad Cream became a wartime favourite like any convenience food was often in limited supply so many of the ration book recipes called for making homemade dressings which tried to replicate salad cream or mayonnaise. Click here for the recipe..
Oaty Biscuits
I’m in love with this wartime cookie recipe. These oaty, sweet, buttery, wartime biscuits really make you appreciate a 15-minute break with a hot cuppa tea in some old vintage china.
This recipe is super simple and quick. Click here!
Hunt Pie
So I have yet to find out why this pie is called ‘Hunt Pie’. The closest I have come is finding a business called ‘John Hunts’ which established itself in 1860 manufacturing pie-making equipment. Could this possibly be linked? Click here!
The Original Lord Woolton Pie
I’ve made a couple of versions of ‘Woolton Pie’ which you will find in my list of re-created recipes here BUT after much research I think now I’ve found the original recipe.
I love Lord Woolton Pie. Thing is I go bonkers for pastry and a generous serving of this comforting vegetable pie with a thick brown Bisto gravy made with the vegetable water, was exactly what I needed today. Click here!
Homity ‘Land Girl’ Pie
Here it is… the promised Homity Pie recipe! Let me tell you, it’s totally delicious, TOTALLY!
Homity Pie is an open-topped pie said to have first been made by Land-Girls during WW2 and supposed to have originated in the West Country.
It’s REALLY difficult finding the original recipe as there are so many bastardised versions hanging around on the internet, so after having researched for hours (yes I am a food nerd) and comparing recipes with rationing, the below recipe is likely the closest version to it’s origins taking into account the scarcity of eggs and onions. Click here!
Mock Banana
Here it is… why not try it for fun. You have to laugh, hopefully we will still have our bananas and there will be no need to resort to parsnips!
Prepper Princess – Love this gal! She lives in the USA, an independent strong woman with lots of self-sufficiency skills working towards financial independence. Click here!
Homestead Tessie – She loves being as frugal and self-sufficient as possible with what she’s got and she loves creating daily videos! Click here!
Compost and Custard – I’ve known Naomi online for over 20 years. She has a passion for self-sufficiency and home schooling, nature, permaculture and wildlife. Click here!
Alaska Granny – The AlaskaGranny channel teaches how to become more resilient and resourceful. I like to use what I have to make what I need, and enjoy sharing tips and tricks to help others do the same. Click here!
Just the other day I was offered some rhubarb out of the boot of a work colleagues car.
For anyone that knows me, if it’s free I’ll make use of it and enjoy it even more knowing that it’s cost me nothing. It’s the mend and make-do philosophy innately ingrained in my psyche. In this case the immediate thought of mouth watering apple and rhubarb crumble with custard that entered my head as soon as my work colleague opened the boot of his car to display his mountain of rhubarb, absolutely solidified this transaction and if he had, at that moment changed his mind, there is no doubt that I would have grabbed an armful and made a run for it.
Today I made the crumble. I made a portion for everyone, I even made a small dish for my work colleague.
It’s been forever since I’ve baked a proper British pudding and every spoonful that entered my mouth was accompanied by sounds of wanton desire that were slightly obscene. There is something wrong with a pudding if it’s consumer doesn’t groan a little…
Here is the authentic WW2 recipe. Enjoy and groan a little yourself…
Apple and Rhubarb Crumble
Filling:
1 lb rhubarb
1 lb tasty apples
2 tablespoons of golden syrup or 2 oz sugar
Topping:
7 oz plain flour
3 oz oats
3 oz margarine or butter
3 oz sugar for topping
1 oz of light brown sugar to sprinkle on top
pinch of salt
Method:
Wipe the rhubarb and cut into small pieces. Simmer in a saucepan with 1 tablespoon of water for about 10 minutes until cooked.
Slice the apples into small pieces. Simmer in a saucepan with 1 tablespoon of water for about 5 minutes until cooked.
Mix rhubarb and apple together when cooked and mix in the golden syrup or sugar.
Grease a pie tin and spoon in the mixture.
Place plain flour, pinch of salt, 3 oz sugar and 3 oz of butter or margarine (in small pieces) into a bowl together.
Rub between fingers to create a breadcrumb like mixture and spoon over the top of the stewed fruit thickly.
Sprinkle with the brown sugar.
Place in an oven at around 170 C for 20 minutes until golden brown.
Serves 6.
Serve with custard.
And as well as eating apple and rhubarb crumble for my dinner I also took some photographs from my garden this afternoon. I picked some of the herbs I grew last year and took photos of the most beautiful dragonfly (I’ve been told its a Migrant Hawker)…it was too beautiful not to share.
It was quite common to mash up your leftover potatoes with other vegetables during the war. One example of this is ‘bubble and squeak’.
To use up the last few potatoes, carrots, parsnips, turnips and swedes that maybe past their best in the larder, they were often scrubbed clean and chopped up into small pieces and boiled together until soft then mashed up with margarine/butter and lots of salt and pepper. To make it even better the mash could be put into a pie dish and browned in an oven.
Through trial and error, for my personal taste I like to make my root vegetable mash with 50% potatoes and then whatever I have left cooked in with it. I really like a parsnip added to root vegetable mash as it gives it an extra flavour boost!
Root Vegetable Mash
Ingredients (I used quadruple the amount below)
Potatoes (2 medium per person)
Parsnip ( 1 medium per person)
Carrots (1 medium per person)
Butter/Margarine
Salt and Pepper
Extras: Some chopped and sauted garlic, fresh thyme and/or chives add a nice touch.
Method
Chop up the scrubbed vegetables and boil until soft in water.
Drain, add salt and pepper, add butter (or dairy free margarine if vegan) and a drop of milk (I use organic oat milk) and mash until you achieve the consistency you like.
Place mixture in large pie dish or two small ones.
Brown in oven.
I haven’t baked or consumed much in the way of sweet puddings or cake for ages. Infact I’m just not using any of my sugar ration and hardly any of my margarine or butter either. I’ve therefore got plenty in my cupboard to do some baking and this is what I’ve done on this bank holiday weekend!
As I am preferring to poach my one shell egg a week, my baking normally has to be egg free. When I came across this wartime recipe online it was perfect! No eggs!
This particular recipe is suitable for vegans too if you use a dairy free margarine or oil.
Was VERY pleased with the taste and consistency of this simple cake and greedily enjoyed a couple of generous slices with hot tea, using my pink vintage china of course!
Hope you enjoy it!
Ingredients
200g caster sugar
2 tablespoons margarine or oil
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon salt
175g raisins, currants or sultanas
350ml water
250g plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
Method
Preheat oven to 180 C / Gas 4. Lightly grease one 7 or 8 inch cake tin.
In a saucepan over medium high heat combine: the sugar, margarine or oil, ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg, ground allspice, salt, raisins and water. Bring to the boil and continue to simmer on low for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool for 30 minutes.
Sift the flour, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda together. Add the flour mixture to the cooled raisin mixture. Stir until just combined. Tip mixture into prepared tin.
Bake at 180 C / Gas 4 for 30-40 minutes until skewer comes away clean from middle.
