British Cakes and tarts you can try: Banbury Cakes - home made, to use up leftover pastry

With some leftover puff pastry we looked for what we could make. In the good old days everybody made all kinds of pastry at home. Now both homes and restaurants use packet mixes. You can buy pancake mix, frozen made up puff pastry ready to roll out and cook, as well as tart bases.

Trips to restaurants, up north, and to supermarkets, show all kinds of regional cakes, pies and biscuits. What can you make quickly with pastry or leftover pastry, or pastry bought made up, ready-made from the supermarket?

We made Banbury Cakes. Here is the result:

What's the difference between a Banbury cake and an Eccles cake?
The Banbury cake is oval.
The Eccles cake is round.

How do you remember which is which? I think of the round cake looking like a circle, like the letter c appearing twice in the middle of Eccles. Or think of the letter c in twice in circle and twice in Eccles.(Banbury is the other one. Oval. Banbury and oval both contain the letter a.)

How do you make it? Roll out your pastry, put in the filling. Pull the outsides of the pastry into the middle above the filling and pinch it all together in the middle like a small bag. Then turn over and flatten it and roll it out with a rolling pin. As you roll it out, you stretch it into an oval pattern.

What is the filling? Traditionally it is dark and looks like mincemeat (which you can buy ready made in a glass jar from a supermarket in the UK). The difference is that mincemeat contains suet. The Banbury cake has currants (or raisins or sultanas), honey (or sugar), candied orange peel - (or fresh lemon peel). You add nutmeg or cinnamon.

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1112640/banbury-cakes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banbury_cake
See Wikipedia for all kinds of English and British cakes.


Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Eating English foods: Bakewell Tart, Banbury cake, Chorley cake, Mincemeat

The two staples of Christmas food in England are mince pies which are cheap and easy to share out at tea time or parties, and Christmas cake for Christmas Day.

Traditional mince pies

One year I went to a party and took along some packs of mince pies which cost £1 from the nearby supermarket. Somebody else had bought from Marks & Spencer, nearer where they lived. I was embarrassed that Marks pies were bigger and better. Deeper. Their mince pies were deeper and juicier with tastier pastry, more buttery, less dry.

Of course each year the suppliers may be different. It's worthwhile buying packs from two supermarkets or two brands from the same supermarket to find out if you can taste any difference. If not, pick the cheapest, or the one with the least sugar or calories if you are on a diet.

Frankly, the easiest way to cut down calories is to eat an apple instead, cut out the calories altogether. Cut calories in half by literally cutting your cake or pie half and sharing one with somebody else. If you are alone, eat half tomorrow.

Or freeze them and forget them. If I am saving food, not for a party but for myself to eat at elevenses or tea time, to prevent myself defrosting and eating the lot, I do portion control. I divide the food up  into separate small parcels. Great for travelling. (One mince pie. One tart. Two slices of brown bread to make a sandwich. One piece of cake in a small sealed box.)

Here are deep filled mince pies from Mr Kipling, in Morrisons.

New to me this year, elf slices.

English Christmas cake

 This is a brown fruit cake with s u l t a n a s and sometimes nuts and white icing on top and usually a little green tree perched on top, anchored with a spike, or the words Merry Christmas in gold foil. This year, Morrisons are stocking a cake with a tree of embossed white icing horizontally on top with a gold star and gold tree container.

Let's start with Bakewell tart, my favourite because it contains almonds. Something sensible, real protein and flavour, not just pastry and sugar.

Bakewell Tart
Imagine a mincemeat tart with almonds and icing on top. Or an almond pastry or almond filling with jam on top. Pastry lid to make it into a mini-pie. Icing on the pastry lid. Buy them from supermarkets. Brands include: Mr Kipling.

I had a wonderful Bakewell tart at Swanwick writers' Summer School in Swanwick just north of Derbyshire. Apparently you can buy an industrial mix which makes a wonderful Bakewell tart for mass catering, cheaper and quicker and more reliable result than cooking vast quantities from scratch.

My family spent weeks researching recipes when I came back from Swanwick. We founded cookery books which had recipes back to the days when Bakewell tart and Bakewell pudding were contending for the accolade of authentic, with two people claiming to have invented or promoted it.

Banbury Tart
You may recall the place name Banbury. The song goes, 'Ride a cock horse to Banbury Cross'.
Puff pastry.

Chorley Cake
Chorley Wood is near London.
A variation with shortcrust pastry. Shortcrust pastry is easy to make yourself.

Eccles Cake
Puff pastry again, with currant filling. Puff pastry is hard to make. I must confess in London, England, we use the roll out puff pastry you buy in a tube from the supermarket. Brand name is Jus rol.
Eccles Cakes has pastry sliced across top in parallel lines.

See more pictures of Eccles cakes in next post.

Home made Eccles cakes.

Photos by Angela Lansbury 2015. Copyright.

***
England now has imports from Europe.

Stollen
My favourite: lots of real marzipan in the middle. German cake made in a large roll shape with a filling of marzipan. sultanas or currants sprinkled through and icing on top.

You can buy a whole one or a tray of bite size pieces. From Waitrose and Tesco.

See next post for home made mince meat and Eccles cakes using Waitrose recipe.

ECCLES CAKE INFORMATION

Eccles is in Greater Manchester.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eccles,_Greater_Manchester 

Right at the end of this article Wikipedia refers you to page on the cake.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.