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bakestone

England: Yorkshire Oatcakes

(recipe adapted from from Grigson's ENGLISH FOOD)

Ingredients:

  • 1 lb finely ground oatmeal

  • 1/2 oz fresh yeast
  • 1 scant teaspoon salt
  • Water to mix: at blood heat

Put the oatmeal and salt in a bowl. Cream the yeast with a teacupful of water, and leave it to rise to a creamy froth.

Mix into the oatmeal and add more water until the batter is like a thick cream.

Ireland: Apple and Potato Cake (Farmhouse-Style Apple Tart with Potato Crust): March 17, 2008

This dish probably started being baked by Irish firesides in its present form about three hundred years ago. It's now baked on halogen and gas and convection cooktops all over the country whenever a home chef wants to make a quick and easy dessert that can with equal aplomb appear cool and demurely sliced on the tea trolley, or as the crown of a country-style supper, piping hot and drizzled with thick Irish cream.

The potato would have been a relatively late addition to the equation. "Filled bannocks" of this kind were being made with merely flour-based doughs in the time of the ancient Celts, who valued the apple not only as a gift and symbol of the Gods, but as one of the relatively few fruits that grows reliably in the Irish climate.

Please note: because of the delicacy of the potato crust, this tart sometimes resists coming out of the pan in one piece (like the example in the background of our picture, which tastefully tore itself in three during removal). The recipe suggests some ways around this problem.

Click on "read more" for the recipe.

Scotland: Oatcakes

MMMMM----- Recipe via Meal-Master (tm) v7.01

 
     Title: Oatcakes (bakestone Recipes)
Categories: Breads, Breakfast
  Servings:  8

 
      4 oz Medium oatmeal*
    1/2 t  Salt
      1 pn Bicarbonate of soda
      2 T  Melted bacon fat**
      2 fl Hot water***

 
  *Grinding down regular rolled oats slightly in a blender or grinder will
  be a help.  **Or beef dripping.  ***Approximately.  -- Mix the oatmeal,
  salt and soda in a bowl.  Make a well in the center.  Pour in the melted
  fat and add enough water to make a stiff dough which can be squeezed into

Ireland: Potato Cakes

MMMMM----- Recipe via Meal-Master (tm) v7.01

 
     Title: Potato Cakes (Bakestone Recipes)
Categories: Breads, Breakfast, Vegetables
  Servings:  8
 

      1 lb Cooked floury potatoes
      1 t  Salt
      2 oz Butter, softened
      4 T  Self-raising flour
      1    Butter for filling

 
  Potato cakes are eaten with bacon and sausages.  It's easier to make them
  with hot, freshly cooked potatoes.  If using cold potatoes, melt the
  butter before adding it.  Choose a floury type of potato, and boil in
  well-salted water. -- Drain the cooked potatoes well, then return to low
  heat in the same pan:  put a dishcloth over the pan and allow the potatoes
  to dry for 5-10 minutes.  (This is called "drying in their steam" in
  Ireland.)  They should be dry and floury at the end of the process.  Sieve
  or rice into a mixing bowl with the salt.  Beat in the butter.  Work in
  sufficient flour to make a soft dough which is easy to handle.  Turn onto
  a floured board and roll or pat out to 3/4 inch thick.  Cut into rounds
  with a 3-inch scone cutter.  Place on the hot greased bakestone and cook
  over a moderate heat until golden brown underneath.  Turn and cook the
  other side.  Remove from the bakestone, split, butter generously, and
  close again.  Keep warm while cooking the next batch.  Serve hot.   (Re
  "self-raising flour":  in Ireland and the UK, this is flour which comes
  with baking powder/baking soda already included.  For this recipe, about
  1/4-1/2 t of baking powder mixed with a plain all-purpose flour will
  substitute nicely.)
 

MMMMM

About the bakestone: The bakestone is a utensil commonly used in the home baking of many traditional European cuisines, especially English and Irish traditional baking.

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