Subject: Victorian tea recipes?

From: [email-masked] (Dwight Starr)
Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1993 13:46:45 GMT

My wifes ladies group at church is having a mother/daughter tea next month.
They have decided to make it a Victorian Tea.

To bring this group a few centuries closer to the present, does anybody
know what might have been served in Victorias day at a luncheon or tea?

Cakes cookies, sandwiches?  

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From: [email-masked] (Kristen McQuillin)
Date: 19 Apr 1993 11:52:09 -0400

Dwight Starr ([email-masked]) wrote:
: My wifes ladies group at church is having a mother/daughter tea next month.
: They have decided to make it a Victorian Tea.

>From _Popular Amusements for Indoors and Out-of-Doors_ published in
1902 (a little past Victoria's days, but will probably pass muster):

A Yellow Tea.
[description of yellow decorations & flowers deleted]
The refreshments may consist of yellow ices, gold cake, yellow peaches
and whipped cream, or bananas and oranges, and yellow ice cream in
fancy designs.

Here are some recipes from the same book:

Chocolate Pudding with Bread Crumbs---Rub sufficient stale bread to
fill a dozen timbale cups. These may be previously brushed with
butter. Put a pint and an half of milk in a double boiler; add half a
cupful of sugar and three ounces of grated chocolate; stir until the
chocolate is dissolved and thoroughly cooked. Take from the fire, and
when cool, pour into four eggs that have been well beaten. Baste this
carefully over the crumbs in the cups. When well soaked up stand ina
pan of hot water. Cover with greased paper, and bake in the oven for
fifteen or twenty minutes. These may be served with vanilla or
chocolate sauce

Lemon Ice---Make a syrup of one and one-half quarts of water and one
and one-half poinds of sugar, and add the grated rind of three lemons,
boiling five minutes. Let cool and add the juice of six lemons.
Strain, and freeze, beating thoroughly. The well-beaten whites of
three eggs may be added when the ice is half frozen, and the freezing
continued. Should the syrup not taste swwet enough, dissolve sugar in
a little water and add before turning into the freezer.

Tell your wife to be sure to plan lots of recitations and entertainments, too!

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From: [email-masked] (Pat Churchill)
Date: Tue, 20 Apr 1993 03:01:38 GMT

Don't forget cucumber sandwiches.  Maybe some toasted crumpets.

Here's a contemporary recipe from Mrs Beeton.

Seed Biscuits

1lb flour
1/4lb sifted sugar
1/4lb butter
1/2oz caraway seeds
3 eggs
Beat the butter to a cream.  Stir in the flour, sugar and caraway
seeds and when these ingredients are well mixed, add the eggs which
should be well whisked.  Roll out the paste, with a round cutter shape
out the biscuits and bake them in a moderate oven from 10 to 15
minutes. The tops of the biscuits may be brushed with a little milk or
the white of an egg and then a little sugar strewn over.  Makes about
3 dozen biscuits.

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