Cawl pronounced ‘cowl’, is Welsh for broth or soup. Like all traditional country soups the ingredients are governed by what is to hand or in season. It appears from easrly Welsh manuscripts that originally the main neat used was bacon, or even kid, for as with Irish Stew no cottager would dream of using valuable …
‘A capital dinner! you don’t get moor mutton, with hot laver sauce every day!’ Collins, 1875. Laver (Porphyra laciniata and green laver (Ulva latissima) are the same as Sloke in Ireland and Scotland, bt they are in much greater daily use in the Swansea and south Pembrokeshire district. Laver is a smooth fine seaweed, sometimes …
These little shortbread cakes, marked with a scallop shell, were made at Aberffrau, a fishing village on the west coast of Anglesey where the shells were found on the beach. They are nearly always called Aberffrau or ‘Berffro’ cakes, appearing under the former in ‘Cassell’s Dictionary of Cookery’, 1885. But they are more properly called …
thanks to www.british-leeks.co.uk for this recipe
Faggots, a speciality of Wales, are exactly the same as the French crepine or crepinettes and yet another link with Brittany. The term faggot is derived from the Old French fagot, meaning a “bundle of sticks or branches, usually meant for use as firewood”. A similar dish called ’savoury ducks’ is found in northern English …
As there is no ‘k’ in the Welsh alphabet, this name is a tremendous puzzle, although the pies were indeed associated with Templeton Fair (Nov. 12th) in Pembrokeshire. Explanations on lines of ‘pussy pies’ are not allowed! Mutton pies like these, spiced and sweetened with sugar and dried fruits (originally made thus to disguise the …
The early version of this enduringly popular Welsh cake was a ‘batter cake’, made with sour cream and baked in a Dutch oven before the fire until it was nice and scrunchy. Often it was made as a means of using up cream when there wasn’t enough for a churning of butter. Most Welsh recipe …
At first glance, this appears to be just another rich dark fruit cake, until one comes to the final stage of embalming, it within a crisp casing of thin icing, when it begins to bear some resemblance to the Black un of Scotland. What gives it its association with South America is the rum, nicely …
‘I often think of apple and ginger fool, and plum pie and medlar trifle’. One of Richard Llewellyn’s memories recalled in ‘How Green Was My Valley’-—-a simple enough dessert lifted out of the ordinary by spicing with ginger. Powdered ginger can be used, but the syrup from stem ginger is better. This recipe appears in …
These are unique: very good hot with fried or pureed potatoes; for breakfast with bacon; or cold for a picnic. ‘The breakfast was delicious, consisting of excellent tea, buttered toast and Glamorgan sausages, which I really think are not a whit inferior to those of Epping.’ George Borrow, Wild Wales, 1862. Originally made with Glamorgan …