AKICILJ

[pameladean]

Which is to say, all knowledge is contained in LJ.

I am hosting my tea group on Saturday. I want to make a particular kind of gingerbread. It's in Bruce Cost's Ginger East to West, but I cannot find my copy, and I haven't got time to rush about hunting it down in bookstores. Has anybody got the cookbook, or did I give the recipe to anybody? It's an early American recipe that is made with blackstrap molasses and no eggs, and it has a quarter-cup of sugar sprinkled over the top before baking, so you have a dark bitter vaguely sweet cake with a crunchy sugar topping.

If you can get me this recipe in the comments or in email or any other way, I'll, I'll, I'll do something nice for you. I'll make you a batch of the gingerbread. I'll send you a signed copy of Tam Lin in hardcover, or another of my books if you prefer. We can negotiate.

Thanks so much!

P.

Edited to Add: I love living in the future. Minnehaha K has found the recipe.

P.

Comments

[wild-irises.livejournal.com]

Alas, my copy of that book went walkabout some years ago. Perhaps it's walking out with your copy?

[pameladean]

It wouldn't be the first time. I've lost track of that book for weeks or months at a stretch at least three times.

It is available used, and seems also to have been revised and reissued, so if this one continues to go missing I'll probably see about replacing it.

P.

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

I have not one but two Early American gingerbread recipes, but I'm not sure if either one is Cost's, since my sources are not documented and I wrote them down years ago. Still, either is possible, since I know I was using that book.

Recipe 1 (contains eggs, so less likely, but sounds v. similar down to sugar on top)

1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup blackstrap molasses
1/2 cup softened butter
2 eggs
1/2 cup sour milk
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375. Cream together sugar and butter; add molasses and mix well. Add eggs one at a time and beating well between additions. Sift dry ingredients together. Add dry ingredients to creamed mix in spoonfuls, pouring in a little sour cream with each addition. Pour into greased and floured 8" by 12" baking pan. Sprinkle top with 1/4 cup sugar. Bake 30 minutes. Serve with whipped cream.

Recipe 2 (my notes say this is from 1796)

1 tablespoon cinammon
ground coriander and allspice to taste; mix above with
4 teaspoons pearl ash (baking soda) in
1/2 pint water;
add 4 lbs. flour and 1 qt. blackstrap molasses and 4 oz. butter (in summer rub in the butter to the whole mix, in winter melt the butter into the molasses and pour on);
knead well till stiff, the longer the better;
wash if desired with egg whites and sugar beat together;
bake brisk fifteen minutes (probably c. 300 degrees) watching to see that it does not scorch.

I have used that one and it is good but must be watched closely due to its, er, authenticity.

[17catherines.livejournal.com]

Well, you can substitute extra baking soda (rising agent), a little vegetable oil (fat) and stewed apples (wet ingredient) for the eggs - that's how I normally do it.

Catherine

[17catherines.livejournal.com]

I wish, I wish I had this recipe! My copy of Tam Lin is falling to bits and I hardly dare read it - is it coming back into print soon? And if so, will it ever make it to Australia?

Catherine with many lovely treacley gingerbread recipes, but not this one.

[pameladean]

It is coming back into print next year. If you can't find a copy, I expect we can work something out.

P.

[17catherines.livejournal.com]

Hooray! I will watch closely for it, and warn my favourite bookshop to watch too. For some reason, a lot of american fantasy/sf titles don't seem to make it to Australia unless specifically ordered...

Happy to help

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

You gave me a similar recipe in March of 2002, by loaning me your cook book, which I do not now have. I have the recipe, though. I made it for the IETF, and they liked it very well.

Molasses Gingerbread from "American Cookery" by Amelia Simmons, 1796 (adapted)

1/2 c butter, softened
1/2 c dk molasses
2 c flour
1 tbs ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda, dissolved in 2 tbs hot water ("dissolved" being critical, I found)
3/4 c. cold water
1/4 c granulated sugar

oven @ 375F Grease and lightly flour 8x8 in. pan

Combine butter and molasses in large bowl, beat until well mixed. In sm. bowl, stir together flour, salt, spices. Stir that into butter mixture. Beat well. Add soda dissolved in hot water, stir to blend well. Beat in cold water, mix well. Spoon into pan, sprinkle sugar on top. Bake 20 min. or 'til toothpick comes out clean.

Mmmmm..... gingerbread.

K.

Re: Happy to help

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

I think that's the modernized/made comprehensible version of my second recipe, which is neat. *takes notes*

Re: Happy to help

[brooksmoses]

I was just thinking the same thing, given the suspiciously identical date, and was flipping back and forth between them to compare before I noticed your comment. Is your version actually missing the ginger entirely, or is that just an omission in the transcription?

Re: Happy to help

[darcydodo]

I'm rather bemused by the fact that your 1796 recipe hasn't got any ginger in it, despite claiming to be gingerbread — in the apparently modernized version, your allspice has been replaced with ginger. :) And while I can see that there's something about the flavors that makes that mildly sensible, the concept of gingerbread without ginger....

Gingerbread without the ginger

[peacockharpy.livejournal.com]

*surfacing from lurkdom*

Many early gingerbread recipes didn't have ginger in them. I have a medieval gingerbrede recipe 'round here somewheres...

Ah. Here it is. From the Harleian manuscript, 1430 (as reproduced in Renfrow's Take a Thousand Eggs or More, vol. 2):

Gyngerbrede. Take a quart of hony, & sethe it, skeme it clene: take Safroun, pouder Pepir, & þrow þeron; take gratyd Brede, make it so chargeaunt that it wol be y-lechyd; þen take pouder Canelle, & straw þer-on y-now; þen make yt square, lyke as þou wold leche yt; take when þou lechyst hyt, an caste Box leves a-bouyn, y-stykyd þer-on, on clowys. And gif þou would have it Red, coloure it with Saunderys y-now.

Redaction:
You probably won't have to boil and skim the honey if you buy it in the store -- that's already been done. But do warm it up. Add saffron and ground pepper to the warming honey, then add breadcrumbs until it's thick enough to be cut. Spread the whole gooey, sticky mess out in a pan and scatter "enough" (your call...) cinnamon over it, then cut it in squares and put a clove and a bay leaf (in lieu of box leaf) on each one.

I've made it, and it's quite tasty (leaving off the clove and bay leaf), but it's nothing like modern gingerbread. It's more of a candy, and instead of cutting it (which is messy) you can mold it like play-dough, if you're so inclined.

Re: Gingerbread without the ginger

[darcydodo]

Very interesting, thanks! Though that doesn't answer why it's called gingerbread.

Re: Happy to help

[pameladean]

K: Yes yes yes, that's it, that's it!

I know you don't want the book; do you want some gingerbread? I don't think I have any plants you want. Well, maybe wild geranium? Email me, we'll work it out.

P.

Re: Happy to help

[pameladean]

Rushthatspeaks, yes, that is exactly what it is.

Seems like you ought to get something nice yourself, since I could have used that recipe in a pinch.

P.

Re: Happy to help

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

Aw, thanks. A piece of gingerbread would be nifty, but I'm not sure where you live, so I don't know if we're close enough together for that to be reasonable. Email me? My username, no spaces or caps, at gmail.com .

Re: Happy to help

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

No, I already have the book, and am too hard on books generally to upgrade the paperback for a HC. A piece of gingerbread would be nice, really.

Or you could just put some time into writing all about the birds and spring in your yard. I've been wishing you would, these last few days. My mertensia virginica just popped up yesterday, and there's lots else going on.

K.

Re: Happy to help

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

I had it, too, but as I'm in Wisconsin Dells at the moment and my recipe box is in Minneapolis, it wouldn't have done you much good.

However, I am reminded of how GOOD that recipe is. I will make it when I get home.

[karenkay.livejournal.com]

Your subject line cracked me up--on the mailing list that I've been on for 15+ years, we often use IMFTATL: It's More Fun To Ask The List.

This sounds like a great cookbook; I'm glad you mentioned it.

"IMFTATL"

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Yikes! I quite understand the concept of social chat mailing lists and have been on some for a very long time, have for years been an administrator or list owner for lists like that, and so on. I enjoy lists like that when you've got a good group of people. Everybody does, really.

But, hoowhee. The "IMFTATL" concept is so infuriating when people do it habitually in all spaces, and out of laziness. Traffic goes up, percentage of interesting content goes down. It's banned in some LJ communities. I had no idea there was an institutionalized acronym for it. I thought "IMFTATL" was something well-tolerated in only a few places. Perhaps I'm right.

It's too late to hope it stays where it seems to have originated. It's been released into the wild. Pity.

K.

Re: "IMFTATL"

[karenkay.livejournal.com]

The "IMFTATL" concept is so infuriating when people do it habitually in all spaces, and out of laziness.

I agree. I don't think it's suitable for all spaces. I like the "2 minute Google search" limitation.

OTOH, it has sometimes been invaluable to me.

Re: "IMFTATL"

[mudandflame.livejournal.com]

I think the concept "It's More Fun to Ask the List" should be countered, wherever it appears, with the attitude that "It's More Fun to Make Up Plausible Misinformation."

[pameladean]

As K knows, my subject line is actually a variation on AKICIF, which stands for All Knowledge is Contained in Fandom, where Fandom means old-style science fiction fandom, though it's probably true of any varied and dedicated group of people regardless of their present aesthetic fixation, or maybe because of it.

P.

[rosefox]

You might enjoy ljgenie.

[aerinha]

Aw, jeez. Wish I had had the recipe. There isn't much I wouldn't do for a nice hardcover copy of Tam Lin. Failing the gingerbread-bribe method, is there somewhere online I can purchase one, that will result in your receiving your proper percentage?

[homemakerj.livejournal.com]

Oh rats. That's the recipe I make every Christmas and think of you, but I'm way late in reading this.

[wonderlandkat.livejournal.com]

I too love the fact I can google or lj anything and do not need to worry about finding something in the encyclopedia or simply trying to remember it.