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Christmas Treats
17th Century spice cake
You really do not need any prior cooking experience for this course so complete beginners are welcome as well an anyone else who would like to try a few new recipes for Christmas.
Includes: All your ingredients, lunch, recipes and course notes and your food to take home.
- Saturday 16th November 2013
- Canada Hall, Battlebridge Lane, Merstham, Redhill, Surrey, RH1 3LH
- 10am to 3.30pm
- £45
- Places for 6 to 8 participants — only 2 places remaining
The details of this course are still being finalised but hopefully these will be the recipes that we will be making.
Every year my aunt cooks a large number of Christmas biscuits. They are all old, family recipes from pre-war Europe and the 6 or 7 varieties that she makes reflects a great reduction over time. My great aunt remembers making around 50 different types for a proper, Austrian Christmas celebration. While being delicious, none of them are anything like the biscuits called lebkuchen that you can buy in the shops. They need to be made early so that by Christmas they have had time to soften up.
On this course we will be using 2 of my family recipes, one for Stollen and one for Lebkuchen, we will also be making something a bit different that has become a firm favourite with my family and hopefully you will like it too.
Stollen is a sweet bread made with marzipan and dried fruit. Although it is available in many shops now, it is expensive to buy and by making it yourself you can vary the amount of marzipan. We will be using my family recipe for this one.
Spanish Marmalade is not really what we would think of as marmalade at all but more of a nutty, dairy free fudge from the 17th century. We will be following a recipe from Elinor Fettiplace's Receipt Book, an excellent book by Hilary Spurling. Spanish marmalade makes a lovely present for some one who can't eat dairy products and its slightly spicy, cinnamon undertones definitely evoke a taste of Christmas.
Lebkuchen has become a bit of a generic term used for all sorts of spiced German biscuits. We will be making at least one type from my aunt's collection and I will try and bring along a couple more for everyone to try over a cup of tea.
 Stollen |
 Dairy-free nut fudge |
 Lebkuchen |
 Stollen |
Booking and Other Information
To find out more information about any of the courses or catering on offer please call Claire Passaris on 07999 871 053.
To book a course please send a booking form and cheque to Claire Passaris, A Taste of the Past, 80 Orpin Road, Merstham, Redhill, Surrey. RH1 3EY. I do require payment in full at the time of booking as I have to pay for everything before the course. However I will not cash your cheques until I have enough people to run the course. Please give me your e-mail address or mobile phone number and I will send you a message a couple of days before I cash your cheque. I will also use it to tell you of any changes to the course details.
A Taste of the Past is registered with Reigate and Banstead Environmental Health Services