Dimanche 22.10.06 It’s a Piece of Cake
Sunday brings another scorcher of a day. At midday I’m up the road in a telephone cabin calling home. Since I cut my Dad off yesterday evening it’s only right I phone home. The cabin has only one panel of glass and there’s a bit of a breeze in the air but I still feel like I’m cooking. It must be 36°C. I can feel the sweat slipping slowly down my back. By the time I’ve walked the 500 yards from the cabin to my door my clothes are fit only for the washing machine. The only wash-day blues are coming from the clear blue sky. There’s super drying. The washed clothes are only out an hour by the time they’re bone dry.
It’s a lazy, hazy afternoon all round. It’s far too hot to do anything other than sit in the shade on the terrace or sit on the sofa by the TV. Nicola rises around mid-afternoon just as the heat is dropping. I’m already mid-cake preparation. I’ve strained the fruit from the tea concoction and am contemplating adding a bit of rhum. For Créole baking the fruit is left to soak in rum not tea; though since this is an Irish cake I decide to stick to the tea. Why waste good drink on snot-faced kids or risk getting told off by the teachers for feeding them alcohol. The soakage used in different countries can tell a lot about the culture. The fact that brack is also known as Tea Brack, that the fruit is soaked in tea and that you eat it with a cup of tea could tell you that Irish people have a weakness for a strong cuppa. But, the notion of a nation of teetotallers is nowhere near the norm.
Here’s the recipe I used for the Barm Brack:
Ingredients - 1 package quick rise dried yeast - 2 cups all-purpose flour - 1/4 teaspoon salt - 3 tablespoons brown sugar - 4 tablespoons butter, melted - 3/4 cup milk, room temperature - 1 egg, slightly beaten - 2 cups dried fruit (mixture of raisins, currents and apricots) - 4 tablespoons diced candied citron – 2 tablespoons mixed spices.
It’s a good job all the quantities are in cupfuls and spoonfuls as our kitchen isn’t equipped with scales. I doubled all the quantities as I wanted to make a big cake for my students to share and a smaller one for Madame Arlette and Charles, or myself – depending on how burnt and broken it turned out. I combined all the dry ingredients and added the ground gingembre (ginger) and cannelle (cinnamon) I had bought in the market. With the butter, milk and egg well whisked I then added them to the flour mixture. Next I stirred in the dried fruits, added some grated lemon rind (from a lemon tree outside our kitchen window) and I poured the mixture into the large moule. I left the mixture to expand and work its magic while the oven heated up. There are only two temperature settings on our gas oven; hot and very hot. I left the first brack in at the highest for 1.5 hours. It turned out slightly browned on the outside yet cooked and moist on the inside. I also put the smaller one in at the highest and it came a bit charred (but still edible) after 45 minutes. I’d enough mixture for another small cake so I put it in at a lower heat and it came out perfect after an hour of babysitting.
All that baking had brought the temperature back up so I settled down to watch Lord of the Flies in the cool living room while the bracks cooled on wire racks in the kitchen. I decided to rename the film Lord of the Mosquitoes as one damn mossy kept annoying me and managed to dodge my numerous swings and slaps. Nicola was outside reading on the terrace. I heard her whimper and hurried scraping chair sounds followed. I peaked outside to see her cowering by the kitchen door, puffing away with a giant toad near where she had been sitting. He was mainly brown with green tinges and he would have fit snugly in a baseball cap. I tried to make him move by prodding him with the long-handled dustpan but the crapaud (toad) wouldn’t budge. Finally with a little liquid persuasion he hopped over to the cupboard and using my brush and dustpan skills I scooped him up and sent him flying. Our neighbour John had told us that there are some poisonous who squirt their milk if they feel threatened so this was all done in a gentle manner without trying to aggravate Mr. Big Load Toad. All the baking in the sun, cooking in the kitchen and the latest toad drama had left me shattered so I hopped off to bed with a tummy full of brack and thoughts of toad-in-the-hole.
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