Miss Foodwise

Celebrating British food and Culture

Archives for November 2013

Hopping down in Kent – Hop brandy

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While driving through the rolling Kentish countryside I can’t help but shout out ‘Oast house’ when I spot the somewhat fairytale like conical rooftops of the hop kilns. I nurture my inner child with my endless enthusiasm for things other people might not even notice anymore.

These monuments of agricultural industrialisation were used for drying the freshly picked green hop flowers. They usually had two or three storeys, some with perforated floors on which the hops were spread out. On the ground flour was a charcoal-fired oven spreading warm air through the kiln which is permitted to pass through the perforated floors to dry the hops. The white wooden cowl on the roof rotates with the wind to allow air to circulate and moisture to escape to prevent mould. Although we are more used to seeing round Oast houses, the kilns started out square shaped. The earliest example dates back to the mid 1700’s and can be found in Cranbrook.

Hops
have been grown in Britain since the the late 15th century and probably
even earlier. They were introduced to Britain from Flanders where
hopped beer had become the fashion. Hops don’t only add bitterness to
beer but also act as a natural preservative. In the early Victorian era
hop growing became the most important industry in Kent as tastes changed
from un-hopped ale to more bitter beer.
The
need for hops was especially great due to the late Georgian law
forbidding the use of any other ingredients than hops and malt in beer. A
year after the law was approved, the drum roaster -used to roast malt-
was invented by Daniel Wheeler. By roasting the malt the brewers could
legally give extra flavouring and colouring to the beer by creating very
dark, roasted malt for the use in Porters and Stouts.

 

Of course those large amounts of hops needed to be picked and so each september the destitute families from London and sometimes even further away, came ‘hopping down to Kent’. If they were not completely pennyless, they could afford the ticket for the ‘Hop pickers Special’ train which left from London Bridge. If they were too poor, they had to walk to Kent. For six weeks they would live on site in hop huts to help with the hop harvest. Although the work was rough, it was a time especially the children looked forward to all year. Hop picking in Kent was a welcome change from the slums is which most of these families lived. And although the hop huts were far from luxury, it was still a welcome breath of fresh air compared to the miserable fog in London. Most of the time it would only be the woman and children who came to pick the hops. Unless if they were unemployed, the men stayed behind in the cities and worked at their jobs in the factories and the docks. The money the woman earned by hop picking was often the only pot of money they could truly manage themselves. Back in the city they would be lucky if their husbands wages weren’t spent on ale every payday.

Hop picking in Kent in this way continued until far in the 1960s, even after the introduction of the first machines. To this day, hop pickers still arrive in the Kentish hop gardens by the beginning of autumn, although now they come from much further places usually Eastern Europe. British labourers are too expensive to hire and usually don’t want to do the work. Hop picking is now far from the ‘Londoners’ holiday’ it was ones considered.

To have a peek in a hop garden, stay tuned for my next post where I will also be cooking with hops.

Today I bring you Hop brandy, a drink not very historical as I haven’t been able to find any reference to it in my books and online. It was my teacher in beer class who told us he brews a bottle of hop brandy once and a while and I got intrigued.
It’s is not safe to brew beer from wild hops, hops need to be tested for certain compounds to be ok to brew with.

Hop brandy

What do you need

Hops, I used Kentish Goldings, enough to fill your bottle of choice
A bottle of Eau de vie, Jenever or another flavourless grain alcohol

Method

Finding your hops will be trickiest part, I used beautiful Kentish Goldings which I ordered from a farm. Let me know if you need the email address of the hop farm. 200 grams left me with quite a large bag.
Back to the recipe, sort out the prettiest flowers and put them in your bottle all the way to the top.
Fill the bottle completely, leave to mature for a few months.

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Sloe Gin >
Damson cheese >
Cobnut Brandy >

Gunpowder, treason and bonfire parkin

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The fifth of november, remember?

One of the most intriguing of English traditions to me is Bonfire night. Otherwise known as Guy Fawkes night it is a feast that commemorates the failing of a plot by Roman Catholic conspirators to blow up the House of Parliament in London killing the Protestant King James in the process.

Although Guy Fawkes is mostly remembered on this occasion, it was Robert Catesby who was chief instigator of the Gunpowder Plot. Catesby turned against the government of Elizabeth I when his father along with so many others Catholics, was prosecuted for refusing to conform to the Church of England. When Elizabeth I died, James – son of the Catholic Mary Queen of Scots – came to the throne which gave the Roman Catholics new hope for greater religious freedom. When this hope turned pear shaped the English Catholics plotted to put Arbella Stuart on the throne, she was Catholic, James’ cousin and a major claimant to the throne of England having both Tudor and Stuart bloodlines. Arbella always stayed close to the throne but never became queen, by blood she had a larger claim to succession and she became known as the ‘Queen that never was’.

The seed to the Gunpowder plot however was planted nearly a century earlier by another Tudor, Henry VIII. When he issued the Act of Supremacy which declared him head of the Church of England to be able to divorce the first of his six wives, he started a century of violent religious turmoil. Henry’s Church of England wasn’t initially Protestant but his son Edward VI instituted more Protestant reforms. Mary I, being Henry’s daughter with his Catholic wife whom he divorced to marry Elizabeth’s mother Anne, was a Catholic and tried to restore the Catholic faith. She started her five year bloody reign by reviving the laws against heresy and was hated for it. The result was the persecution of Protestant rebels and the execution of some 300 heretics. Elizabeth’s accession to the throne on Mary’s death was greeted with enormous jubilation from the people. Yet again the Roman Catholics were facing persecution and the plotting to replace Elizabeth I with Mary Queen of Scots began.

 

This brings us back to Mary’s son James and the infamous Gunpowder treason and plot.
On the 5th of november 1605 Guy Fawkes was apprehended while guarding 36 barrels of gunpowder in the cellar under the house of Parliament. How they found out about the gunpowder in the cellar leads to speculation but it is presumed that someone from within the circle of conspirators of the plot warned someone to stay away from parliament on the 5ft. After his apprehension Fawkes was tortured to give up the names of his accomplices.
The signature on his confession after who knows how many hours – days – of torture is somewhat shaky but you can clearly make out his name. This confession however is said not to show all the names of those involved. The confession believed to be signed one day later shows all the names and the signature is that of a broken, beaten and suffering man. The letters are barely coming together, you can faintly see the name Guido but I guess the surname was too much. It is some what disturbing to see his handwriting change in such a manner but it is quite remarkable that these documents were saved.
Guy (or Guido) Fawkes was executed along with several of his conspirators after being tried for high treason januari 1606. the sentence was hanging, drawing and quartering.
Parliament passed and act that called for the 5th of november to be celebrated as a joyful day of deliverance. There are a lot of rhymes associated with this day and although the earliest is said to date back to 1742, I have not found the source and therefore can not believe it to be accurate. The rhyme ‘Remember Remember the 5th of november’ adapted by for movie V for Vendetta has however been in practice for decades.

Pennies for the Guy

To this day the Houses of Parliament are still traditionally searched by the Yeomen of the Guard just before the State Opening which was the day on which the plot was discovered. Straw or cloth effigies of Fawkes called ‘Guys’ are often made by youngsters and carried around displaying them to passers-by asking for ‘A penny for the Guy’ and often they are burned in the bonfire celebrations. Food is a big part of the tradition today with bonfire toffee, toffee apples and spicy parkin cakes. A parkin is a sticky ginger cake from the north of England and because Guy Fawkes was a Yorkshireman it has since been associated with bonfire night.

My research into bonfire night continues and I am sure next year I will have plenty more to share with you. I want to look deeper into the links with pagan rites and folklore.

But for now this will have to do and I leave you with a parkin.
After quite a few recipes tested, some over a 100 years old and some new, I came to this one and think it makes an enjoyable cake. In the parkin you see in the pictures of this post I used porridge oats, they were too rough so I changed the recipe to medium oatmeal. How this recipe turned out you can see the picture that comes after the recipe, this one I took just before dark so excuse the messy picture, I had to be quick about it.
If you are lucky enough to be in England next weekend when the large bonfires will be lid, I wish you loads of fun and plenty of food and booze to keep you going.

Toffee apples


If you want to make the toffee apples, check out this recipe here >
I just replaced the lollypop sticks with branches from a tree in my garden, looks ever so pretty.

Bonfire parkin

What do you need

For 9 squares

  • 100 g (3ó oz) rolled oats (see page 16)
  • 200 g (7 oz) golden syrup or maple syrup
  • 45 g (1ó oz) Lyle’s black treacle or molasses
  • 200 g (7 oz) butter
  • 200 g (7 oz) oat flour
  • 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)
  • 2 tsp ground ginger
  • 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
  • 1 egg
  • 2 tbsp whisky or milk
  • pinch of sea salt

Method

For a 20 cm (8 inch) square cake tin

Preheat your oven to 160°C (320°F) and prepare the cake tin (see page 21).

Briefly pulse the oats in a food processor fitted with the blade attachment.

Heat the golden syrup, black treacle and butter in a saucepan until melted and combined. Set aside to cool for a few minutes, then add the chopped oats and the

remaining ingredients. Combine well with a wooden spoon or spatula. Spread the mixture into the cake tin.

Bake for 50–60 minutes and then cool in the tin. When the cake is cold, cut it into squares and pack it in an airtight container to rest for at least a day before serving.

The cake gets stickier and more moist every day and can last for 2 weeks if you can hide it for that long.

Enjoy!

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Bonfire, Bangers and riots >