SC - Re: Cracknels

[Kathleen M Everitt]

On Sun, 7 Dec 1997 10:16:52 -0600 (CST) alysk at ix.netcom.com (Elise
Fleming ) writes:
>Master Huon asked what cracknels were.  This is from _'Banquetting 
>Stuffe'_, page 96-97, the chapter written by Peter Brears.
>
>"Various other sponge-textured biscuits became popular during the 
>seventeenth-century - the Naples biscuits, Italian biscuits, Prince 
>biscuits, drop biscuits, almond biscuits, lemon biscuits, shell-bread, 
>
>etc. - all made from combinations of ine flour, sugar, eggs, and 
>various flavourings.  In addition, there were both cracknells and 
>jumbals, which had originally been plunged into a pan of boiling 
>water, 
>from which, after a short time, they rose to the surface, were caught 
>in a skimmer and only then transferred to the oven.
<snip>
>If I can 
>find 
>one, I will post it, but perhaps others have a recipe at hand???
>
>Alys Katharine

Cool! I always suspected that Grandma was right out of the Middle Ages! I
have a recipe for what my grandmother always called "Biscuits" (okay it
was with an Italian accent and I have no idea how to spell the way she
pronounced it) that sounds like this. It's not period, cause it has
baking powder in it. But you might be able to play around with it and get
something close out of it. Here goes, anyway:

1 dozen eggs
12 T. sugar
12 T. oil	
2 t. baking powder
anise oil to taste (she sometimes used lemon oil instead)
Flour to stiffen (sorry. All Grandma's recipes say that! I haven't made
these in a long time, but if I remember, it takes about 20 cups to
stiffen 1 dozen eggs worth of batter.)

Mix all together to make a stiff dough. Shape like doughnuts. Drop into
boiling water until they rise to the surface. Drain on towels. Slit all
the way around then bake at 425 until lightly browned.


Have fun with it. But I'd be interested if anyone has a more period
version myself!

Thanks.

Julleran
============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================