APPLE TEA COFFEE CAKE

Last week while visiting my elderly parents, I came across a brochure my Mom had gotten in the 1980's.   It was from the Lipton Tea Company and included 6 recipes with tea in them.  Some of you will remember how we often wrote away for free recipes - before internet days!   If you go to the Lipton Website they have quite a few recipes - although many don't necessarily contain tea but are foods to accompany tea.

Here's one of the recipes from the brochure:

APPLE TEA COFFEE CAKE:

You will need:  2 cups boiling water, 4 teabags, 1 tart apple, peeled, cored and chopped, 1 1/4 cups sugar, 2 cups flour, 1/2 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp baking soda, 12 tablespoons butter, softened, 2 eggs, 1/2 cup of sour cream and 1 tsp vanilla extract

For the topping: 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/3 cup flour, 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon, 3 Tb cold butter cut into pieces and 1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.  In a med. bowl, pour boiling water over tea bags and brew 5 minutes.  Remove tea bags and stir in the chopped apple and 1/4 cup of the sugar.   Let stand for 1 hour and then remove the apples. Reserve 1/4 cup of the tea liquid.

In another med bowl, combine flour, baking powder and baking soda, set aside.

In a larger bowl, mix butter and sugar until blended, adding eggs, sour cream and the 1/4 cup of tea liquid and vanilla.  Gradually beat in flour mixture and apples. Turn into a greased 9" spring form pan.  Top with crumb topping and bake for 1 hour.  Cool before removing from pan.    Serves 10

ENGLISH GINGERBREAD

We all  love smell the gingerbread?

  Right out of the oven!

This morning I baked some lovely English Gingerbread.  I am calling it "English" because the recipe came out of a UK published cook book called "Baking".  I am sharing the recipe too with a little more spice added to it!

Here is what you will need for this English Gingerbread: 3 1/2 cups sifted flour, 3 Tsp baking powder, 1 tsp baking soda, 3 Tsp ground ginger, 6 oz butter, 3/4 cup brown sugar, 1/2 cup black molasses, 1/2 cup dark corn syrup, 1 egg and 1 1/4 cups of milk.

I also added 1/2 tsp ground cloves

 and 1 tsp cinnamon

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.  This recipe called for baking 1 1/2 hours but I found it was done in 1 hour.  Also,  Line 9" square pan with parchment paper.

Begin by mixing the flour, baking soda & powder and spices into a large mixing bowl.

Melt the butter on your stove with the brown sugar, molasses and syrup in a medium pan until melted and dissolved. Mix the egg with the milk and add the melted butter mixture and then add these to the flour mixture and beat well. Pour into pan and bake.

This cookbook was produced in Bath....

When I was a little girl, there was a friend down the street named Mary Lou Iams and her brother Vernon.  I used to love going to her small house as her mother would let us bake a box of gingerbread.  Her kitchen was an "everything in it's place" kitchen and of course we would wash every dish and put everything back perfectly. I can still remember that wonderful experience of how the gingerbread smelled.