List of Kentish Recipes

List of Kentish Recipes

Angels on Horseback

Apple Muffins

Appledore Chicken Pie

Biddenden Cakes

Blackberry & Apple Bread & Butter Pudding

Cabbage & Hazelnut Rolls

Canterbury Pudding

Cherry Batter Pudding (version I)

Cherry Batter Pudding (version II)

Chocolate & Raspberry (or Cherry) Brownies

Kentish Apple Cake

Flead Cakes

Ginger Cobnut Cake (version I)

Ginger Cobnut Cake (version II)
Good Tea-Cakes

Gypsy Tart (with Apple Slices!)

Hodge Podge

Joe Grey Stew

Kent Lent Pie/ Kent Pudding Pie/Folkestone Pudding Pie

Kent Oast Cakes

Kent Twice Laid

Kentish Cherry Batter pudding
Hopscotch

Kentish Cobnut cake

Kentish Huffkins (version I)

Kentish Huffkins (version II)

Kentish Pigeons In A Pot With Plums

Kentish Pudding

Kentish Rarebit

Kentish Strawberry Shortcake

Kentish Well Pudding (Kentish Puddle Pudding)

Lamb Barley Casserole

Lamb With Cherries

Lamb's Tail Pie

Maidstone Biscuits

Oast cakes

Pokerounce

Squab Pie

Tunbridge Wells Wafers or Romary 
Tunbridge Biscuits -  Wafer, Currant, Lemon, Ginger & Seed
Tunbridge Water Cakes

Wafers

Whitstable Dredgerman's Breakfast

We know of, but have yet to find recipes for:
Damson & Cobnut Mincemeat
Watercress & Cobnut Soup

Chocolate & Raspberry (or Cherry) Brownies

Chocolate & Raspberry (or Cherry) Brownies

6 oz (175g) unsalted butter melted with

6 oz ( 175g) chocolate broken into pieces in a bowl over hot water. Cool, add pinch of salt and 8oz (225g) golden caster sugar.

3 large eggs. - gradually beaten in

4 oz (115g) plain flour – add and beat well.

6oz (175g) raspberries/pitted cherries - stir in carefully and pour into the tin.

Line a 8” square baking tin with baking parchment.

Bake 25-30 mins 180C/Gas 4, until the top is pale brown but the middle is still dense and gooey. 

Leave to cool in the tin before cutting into squares. Cool completely before removing from the tin.

Kentish Strawberry Shortcake

Kentish Strawberry Shortcake

225g plain flour

200g butter

115g caster sugar

115g ground rice

Rub butter into flour until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.  Add caster sugar and ground rice

Knead mixture gently together until it forms a ball.

Roll out to ¼in thick. Cut into rounds with a 2in biscuit cutter.  Chill the rounds in fridge till firm.

Bake in a cool oven at 160°C for 10-15 min

For the filling

1 punnet of strawberries

½ pint of double or whipping cream

 

Whip cream till thick (add 1 tsp icing sugar and a few drops of vanilla essence if you like a sweeter cream)

When the shortbread rounds are cool, sandwich together with a layer of cream and sliced strawberries

Dust over the tops with icing sugar

Melt a little plain chocolate and drizzle over the top .

Serve with extra strawberries

Kentish Cobnut Cake

Kentish Cobnut Cake

450g/1lb self-raising flour

225g/8oz butter, melted, plus extra butter for greasing

1 tbsp ground ginger

225g/8oz light soft brown sugar

6 free-range eggs, beaten

110g/4fl oz double cream

150g/5oz cobnuts, shells removed, finely chopped

For the apple compôte

50g/2oz butter

4 apples, peeled, cores removed, finely chopped

2-3 tbsp caster sugar

½ tsp ground cinnamon

200ml/7fl oz double cream, lightly whipped, to serve

For the cobnut cake, preheat the oven to 160C/325F/Gas 2. Grease a 1kg/2lb 2oz loaf tin with butter. In a bowl, mix together the flour and melted butter until well combined. Add the ground ginger, sugar and beaten eggs and beat until well combined. Add the cream and mix until the mixture forms a smooth, thick batter. Stir in the chopped cobnuts until well combined. 

Spoon the mixture into the prepared loaf tin, gently spreading the batter into all the corners and shaking the tin to make sure the mixture has settled. Transfer the loaf tin to the oven and bake for 1-1¼ hours, or until the cake has risen and is golden-brown, and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. Set the cake aside to cool slightly in the tin.

Meanwhile, for the apple compôte, heat the butter in a frying pan over a medium heat. When the butter is foaming, add the apples, caster sugar and ground cinnamon and cook for 4-5 minutes, or until the apples have broken down slightly and the mixture has thickened

 To serve, cut the cake into six to eight slices (it is best served still warm). Serve each slice with a dollop of whipped cream and a spoonful of warm apple compôte.

Kentish Apple Cake

Kentish Apple Cake

225g self-raising flour
pinch of salt
2tsp ground mixed spice or cinnamon
255g light brown soft sugar
4 eggs, lightly beaten
200ml sunflower oil
310g apples, cored and diced (roughly 3 apples)
100g sultanas
Demerara sugar

Sieve the flour, salt and spices into a bowl and then stir in the sugar.

Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and add the eggs and the oil.

Mix until completely smooth and then add the apple and sultanas. Spoon into a lightly greased 30x20cm tin and sprinkle with sugar

Bake at 180’C (Gas Mark 4) for 25-30 minutes until risen and golden.

Tunbridge Biscuits - Wafer, Currant, Lemon, Ginger & Seed

We haven't yet tried these recipes. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.

Tunbridge [unable to establish whether this is Tonbridge or Tunbridge Wells] seems to be a specialist centre for biscuits. They not only differ in ingredients but also in shape and thickness.

Tunbridge Wafer Biscuits

Said to be similar to Tunbridge Water Cakes and are derived from them.
 

8 lbs of flour

2½ pints of cream

4 eggs

2 lbs of very fine loaf sugar

4 oz of ginger

Mix in the usual way; roll the dough very thin on an even board or marble slab; dock the surface over with a captains biscuit docker cut them into round cakes about the size of Shrewsburies; put them on very clean dry tins slightly dusted with flour and bake them in a moderately cold oven. When baked they may be put in piles whilst hot and pressed to make them flat and even.

Currant Tunbridge Biscuits

 
8 lbs. of flour

2 lbs. of butter

3 lbs. of sugar

1½lb. of currants

1½lb. of ground almonds

8 eggs

½ pint of milk

¼oz. of volatile salt.

Mix.
Roll the dough into sheets nearly a quarter of an inch in thickness, dust with loaf sugar, pass the rolling-pin over the surface again, and cut it into biscuits with an oval cutter, the same size as for lemon biscuits.

Place on buttered tins about half an inch asunder, and bake in a moderately quick heat. 

Lemon Tunbridge Biscuits

 
As the last; or use 8 lbs. of flour, 1 1/2 lb. of butter, 1 1/2 lb. of sugar, 6 eggs, 1 pint of milk, 1/4 oz. of volatile salt. (the recipe seems to forget to list lemons as an ingredient)

 

Ginger Tunbridge Biscuits
 

As the last, using 2 1/2 lbs. of sugar, 4 oz. of ground ginger, and 10 eggs, with sufficient milk to make a dough.

Seed Tunbridge Biscuits

 
6 lbs. of flour, 2 1/4 lbs. of powdered sugar, 1 1/4 lb. of butter, 6 eggs, a dram of volatile salt, and sufficient milk to make the whole into a dough about the consistence of walnut dough, with a few caraway seeds.

Roll the dough into sheets about a quarter of an inch in thickness, dust the surface with finely powdered loaf sugar during the rolling; cut into cakes with an eighth cake cutter (sic), and dock them with a diamond carved docker. Place on buttered tins about a quarter of an inch asunder, and bake in a moderately heated oven; let them be of light brown on the surface and bottom when done.

Tunbridge Water Cakes

We haven't yet tried this recipe. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.

Tunbridge Water Cakes

 
1 1/4 lb of flour

½ lb of sugar

6 oz of butter

Mix with milk or water and a little orange flower water.

Rub the butter in with the flour; add the sugar and make the whole into a paste; roll it out very thin; cut it out with a plain round or scalloped cutter about the same size as for Shrewsburies; place them on clean tins or buttered paper and bake them of a pale delicate colour in a cool oven.

Good Tea-Cakes & Tunbridge Cakes

We haven't yet tried this recipe. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.

Good Tea-Cakes

 
Rub four ounces of butter into eight ounces of flour, and mix with this six ounces of cleaned currants, the same of beat sugar, and three beat eggs. 

Make this into a paste, and roll it out about a half-inch thick, and stamp out the cakes of any size you please with a wine-glass, ale-glass, or small tumbler, by running a paste-cutter round the glass. 

[No cooking info given!]

Dust the top with sugar.

Tunbridge Cakes

 
Make tea cakes as above, of any size you please, and strew caraway-comfits over the top.

Tunbridge Wells Wafers, or Romary

We haven't yet tried this recipe. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.



Tunbridge Wells Wafers or Romary

150g plain flour
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
55g treacle (This old recipe could require black treacle or golden syrup, as the term ‘treacle’ has in the past been used for both substances. Black treacle biscuits would be more of an acquired taste and golden syrup more of a crowd-pleaser.)
55g butter
55g caster sugar or soft brown sugar

Preheat oven to 150C/300F/Gas 2 (the recipe says a ‘very moderate oven’)
Prepare two baking sheets by lining with greaseproof paper.
In a medium sized saucepan melt the butter, treacle and sugar. Don’t allow the mixture to become too hot - as soon as the ingredients have blended remove from the heat.
Sift the flour, baking powder and ginger into a bowl. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the warmed mixture, stirring to combine after every spoonful and mix to a paste. It is easier to handle the paste if it is used while still warm.
Divide into three portions. On a floured surface roll out each portion as thinly as possible and cut to shape.
Bake for about 10 minutes.
Allow to cool for a few minutes only, before transferring to a wire rack.

Squab Pie ( Description only)

We haven't yet tried this recipe. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.

Squab Pie

 

(Kent) A squab is a young pigeon so perhaps this recipe has different origins.

Take two pounds of the best end of the neck of mutton, cut it into small pieces, flavour with salt and pepper, and put a layer of it at the bottom of a pie-dish, next add a layer of sliced apples and onions, with about a dessertspoonful of brown sugar, then another layer of mutton. Cover with a good pie-crust, and bake as an ordinary meat pie.

Hodge Podge (Description only)

We haven't yet tried this recipe. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.


Hodge Podge

(Kent, 1809)

Take a quantity of shelled green peas, with onions, carrots, and turnips, and a sprinkling of salt and pepper. Put them into a pot with a lid, with a quantity of water corresponding to the quantity of soup wanted, containing a few mutton or lamb chops. Let the mess boil slowly, or simmer for five or six hours.

Angels on Horseback

We haven't yet tried this recipe. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.

Angels on Horseback

A well known recipe but it's said to have originated in Kent; Whitstable is a logical assumption.

8 oysters
8 rashers bacon
4 slices buttered toast

Remove oysters from shells.

Wrap each oyster in a rasher of bacon.

Place on a skewer and grill until bacon is cooked.

Serve on hot buttered toast.

Biddenden Cakes (Description only)

We haven't yet tried this recipe. But we'd love to hear about it if you do.

Biddenden Cakes

 

Hard cakes ( more like biscuits) distributed annually as part of the 'Biddenden Dole', each one bearing the image of two females, said to be the conjoined sisters Eliza and Mary Chulkhurst, who, in the 12th Century, left a gift of land, called the Bread and Cheese Lands, to provide aid to the poor.

The cakes, baked from flour and water, are so hard as to be almost inedible but make good souvenirs as they bear the very curious effigy