The late 19th and early 20th centuries were periods of major upheaval in British cookery and food which saw the demise of the excesses of Victorian dining (where even breakfast could consist of 10 or more dishes) as the frugality of the First World War bit home. Admittedly, many of the recipes we have come from the bigger houses, but they show an interesting trend. That towards more use of ingredients from the kitchen garden and the bulking-out of exotic ingredients with home-grown ones to give dishes more bulk.
The Victorians were in love with taking European (particularly Italian) dishes and giving them an English twist (which is where Macaroni and Cheese comes from). The same also applied to various spices and dishes from the Empire, particularly from India though Victorian cooks tended to have no idea of how to use the spices properly (as a result curry spices and curry pastes were added raw to a dish rather than being cooked in oil before being added). Partly this was due to the rise of a middle class with no pre-concieved idea about the preparation of food and partly it was due to ex-patriots returning from far-flung corners of the Empire and bringing new tastes and cuisines back with them.
A lot of this culinary adventurousness was lost during the privations of the First and Second world wars and the great depression of the 1920s and it's here that English cuisine's reputation for bland stodginess appeared. But even during the early 20th Century, despite the lack of many ingredients food wasn't all bland!
Here, an exuberant Victorian dish is compared to a more homely Edwardian one.
Chicken in the Heather
This is a traditional Victorian dish from Scotland that uses the rave ingredient of the day 'curry powder'
Ingredients:
1 whole chicken
90ml cooking oil
120ml clear heather honey
salt and freshly-ground black pepper, to taste
100g Dijon mustard
1/2 tsp curry powder
1 garlic clove, chopped
Method:
Place the chicken in an oven-proof casserole dish. Whisk all the other ingredients together and brush liberally over the chicken then pour the remainder over the top of the bird. Cover the casserole and place in an oven pre-heated to 190°C.
Cook for an hour then remove from the oven, base liberally with the pan juices and return to the oven, uncovered, for a further half hour. Serve with mashed potatoes and steamed vegetables.
Pumpkin and Banana Bread
This is a traditional Edwardian cake that bulks-out expensive bananas with pumpkin to produce a surprisingly moist and tasty cake.
For the Icing:
120g cream cheese
50g unsalted butter
300g icing sugar
zest of 1 orange
juice of 1 orange
Add the pumpkin and peeled bananas to a bowl and mash together then beat in the eggs, sugar and oil until pale and well combined. Sift the flour, baking powder and spices into a third bowl then fold-in the pumpkin mixture. Add the walnuts and stir to combine.
Divide the resultant batter between two 1kg loaf tins that have been lined with greaseproof paper then place in an oven pre-heated to 180°C and bake for about 55 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake emerges cleanly.
Allow to cool in the tins for 10 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. When cold cream together the cream cheese and butter until light and fluffy. Add the orange juice and orange zest, beating to combine thoroughly. Add the icing sugar until the mixture thickens (you should need most of it) and spread thickly on the top of both loaves. Garnish with a few strips of finely-pared orange zest.
