J.R.R. Tolkien was born on this day, 1892. And though hundreds of pages are written about his life, I hope devoted fans won't mind yet another blogger's notes on a winter recipe. To begin with, Chapter VII of The Hobbit
does not imply that Bilbo & the Dwarves visit the Skin-Changer's
house in the winter. All the same, Beorn's honey cakes perfectly match the
season.
'Queer lodgings'
Beorn, a giant by daylight changing into a bear after sunset, lives in a cottage where he breeds animals, including sheep and horses. His diet consists of milk, butter & honey which is produced by his enormous-sized bees. When he learns about Thorin's quest, he offers ponies that will carry him to Mirkwood in no time as well as "nuts, flour, sealed jars of dried fruits, and red earthenware pots of honey, and twice-baked cakes". The cakes (whose recipe is secret) are made with honey, keep well & taste good. No-one complains of their being hard, really, although Tolkien notes that eating them made you thirsty. There is such a feeling of homeliness about this chapter and it's partly due to food references like this. (Unfortunately it doesn't show in the film adaptation, from which much of Beorn's tale is absent.)
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| King Edward's School in Birmingham, where Tolkien was a pupil in the 1900s |
English goodness
What I love, what everyone loves about Tolkien's best-sellers is the world of English comfort he paints in such detail, which helps make its loss understood when Evil intervenes. The Shire reminds of the English countryside, and Hobbit diet of the English cuisine. When Bilbo eventually resolves to follow Thorin Oakenshield, he leaves behind a cellar which is (normally) packed with English goodness: butter, cheese, honey, eggs, mutton, apple-tart... The only good thing about Beorn's hardtack is the amount of honey used for sweetener. In all other respects, a Hobbit would prefer cakes, biscuits, tarts and other delicious stuff that we now label as comfort food. So if he was still at home instead of chasing dragons, Bilbo would probably dip those oven-dried cakes of Beorn's in milk.
BEORN'S CAKES
This recipe is adapted from an Italian quickbread by Elizabetta Piacezza (50 ricette per dolci, torte & dessert, Bonechi editions, 2003). I'm not sure Beorn would have added spice. Keep half the batch soft - it's a delicious honey cake that makes you really thirsty!
I n g r e d i e n t s
250g rye flour
150g fir-tree honey
100g brown sugar
250ml whole milk
1tbsp baking soda
1tbsp cinnamon
1tsp aniseed (optional)
30g butter, melted
M e t h o d
1. Preheat the oven to 180 C. Grease a 20x20cm baking tin with butter. 2. Gently heat the milk, honey & sugar in a pan and set aside to cool. 3. Sift the flour with the baking soda, cinnamon & aniseed (if using). 4. Combine the mixtures and knead. 5. Transfer to the greased baking tin and bake in the middle of the oven for 45 minutes or so, covering with aluminum foil if the surface gets too dark. 6. Cool on a wire rack. 7. Cut into slices and place on a baking sheet, lined with parchment paper. Bake at 100 C in the middle of the oven for as long as it takes. For both sides to dry, you must turn over halfway through baking. 8. Let cool in the oven until the next day. Keep in a biscuit jar.
N o t e
For drying the cakes in Beorn's fashion: Divide the cake into squares, and each square into halves. Place on a sheet as per recipe, prolonging baking time. Alternatively, place the uncooked dough in muffin tins and bake twice, using the instructions above.
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