"Welsh cakes"

Oh, my mind goes back to the days when Mary brought the milk round from the farm! Wonderful, rich and the cream on top was great on fruit or whatever! Regulations changed, all had to be pasturised. Off it went in churn to town and came back with a milkman. Never tasted as good!

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I was very lucky as a child in that we had farming friends with cows, who would deliver to us fresh unpasteurised milk in the mornings, often when it was still warm (mmmm…blasus iawn). No idea what the fat content was, but it was certainly far above the 4% that is ‘full fat’ these days.

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We had a jersey house cow when I was growing up which I used to milk by hand as a teenager. The left over milk that we didn’t use ourselves or sold to friends was left out at night, turned into yoghurt and was fed to our pigs.
I do our welsh cakes on a iron bakestone now, as well as wraps (so easy, never need to buy them), naan breads, pizza bases…any flat breads.

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Gravel. Sheer luxury. We were so poor we used to make them out of mud and sand that we’d licked off the soles of our feet.

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On the positive side (both you and @Y_Ddraig_Las are scientists, so you know this) the pasteurised stuff wasn’t full of ecoli and listeria. Swings and roundabouts. :wink:

Nobody in our village ever got ill from drinking milk from Mary’s cows!

It never did me any harm, f’tang f’tang ni fel whoop… Sorry one of my little moments.

The advice is to avoid unpasterurised (raw) milk if you are pregnant or otherwise immuno-compromised. There is a lot of evidence now that raw food with some bad bugs in is good for you and your immune system. Overly sterile food has been linked with increased risk of allergies and other health problems. Just be sensible basically.

Also, if you do consume raw milk try to make sure it’s from free-range cows that graze on pasture, these healthier cows carry a lot less bugs as their own immune systems work better than indoor grain fed cows . Please support pasture promise (http://www.freerangedairy.org/make-the-pasture-promise/). Having done a masters in cow rumen microbiology is has become a passion of mine to communicate the importance of this. The cows are happier too :grinning:

When I was living in tropical forests, nothing was sterile, we ate beef from the local market that had spent the hot tropical day sitting on a market stall table covered with flies. We cooked it more well than we would at home to kill the bugs, but it was incredibly tasty! The thing is for several years after my 3 months of being exposed to all sorts of tropical bugs, I had a super immune system and didn’t get even slightly ill for several years. I know it’s only one data point, but there is lots of evidence for the benefits of an active immune system.

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I think I’ll take a pass on the super immune system, if you don’t mind. I’m on medication for life to stop myself from rejecting various internal organs as it is. :wink:

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Hi! I did a one week Welsh course at Lampeter University - they told me “pice bach”, which is probably a variation of “picau bach”. I then went ito town to buy some in my best learner Welsh, and the lady said that they say “Welsh cakes” in Welsh!!! I’ll stick with Pice Bach.

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Isn’t Parkin a yummy Northern oat and treacle concoction, sometimes with ginger, but I liked it better without. Not much like Welsh cakes at all,

Yes. My dad’s from Barnsley. Parkin is a kind of ginger cake eaten on bonfire night. I tried making it once, but you had to soak the oats for about a week so I never bothered again because by the time I had thought about making it for November 5th it was too late!

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Can you see what it is yet?




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Taaaa daaaaa
My first ever welsh cakes :slight_smile:

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I did some baking tonight, and while it isn’t Welsh cakes I thought I’d share it here anyway! I picked up this little book called “A Book of Welsh Bread” by Bobby Freeman at a castle in Wales and finally baked something out of it: three-grain bara with barlys a rhyg (barley and rye).

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I think I’ve done almost every recipie in the books she’s written! That’s a great looking loaf you’ve made. Blas o Gymru!

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I’ll have to see if I can find any other books by her, since this bread worked out so well!

A list of books by Bobby Freeman. Not sure about overseas postage though.

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They look good. I wouldn’t have put the sugar on them, I find it a bit superfluous, but nevertheless, some fine examples! :slight_smile:

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To @Pete2 and @anabel, I’m not sure whether to thank you for pictures which make me feel hungry, but you are both brilliant! My bread never rose as well as it should and I cannot make pastry or welsh cakes, only rather indulgent biscuits which cost so much to make I didn’t dare tell the WI the true cost and they were sold at a loss! I do not make such things now, only essential meals!

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I always wonder who “they” is when people say things like “they say”!