Today I read a very pertinent review of John Seymour's other book (The Forgotten Arts and Crafts), which read:
I really thought this book would be about
1) The forgotten crafts
2) How to learn to do them
What
I got was a lot of reminiscing and stories about how things were better
before mean 'ol World War I came along and industrialized England.
Beginning to read the chapters of this book, I see this person has a real point.
The first chapter on food preparation is divided into 6 sections:
* savoury puddings
* desserts
* chopping, pounding and pulping
* beating
* cake mixes
* pastry making
Some of these I think are good fodder for investigating 'forgotten household crafts', and some of them less so. The section on cake mixes seems to basically cover how as a boy he preferred eating the cake batter to the actual finished product.
And that's about it.
So I might not be addressing that one in quite so much detail.
He does however talk a lot about puddings (both sweet and savoury) and they seem like things I should be investigating. We've all heard of Yorkshire puddings - but what about Essex or Suffolk puddings? Summer pudding is fairly well known - but what about Cambridge pudding?
But of course there are no recipes.
So I will have to broaden my net to investigate other sources of such knowledge, as Mr. Seymour is not hugely forthcoming on the issue. I do have a few tricks up my sleeve, not least of which involving pinching my mum's copy of "Mrs. Beeton's Household Management" when I visit at Christmas (mwahahaa), but I suspect a trip to the library is in order.
Does anyone have any recommendations for useful books...? Please let me know!
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