Savouries
The savoury ’course’ is the genteel opening to any afternoon tea or supper. We know we should eat a small sandwich or a cheese pastry before we dive into the sponge kisses or lamingtons – and if they are delicious enough we are likely to go back for more at the end. These are the kind of recipes that appear in the ‘Some Cheese Notions’ chapter of the Women’s Institutes’ Home Cookery Book – old faithfuls and firm favourites.
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Cheese Turnovers
I found this recipe in the 'Otago Witness' while researching a book about Frances Hodgkins’s paintings for the Dunedin Public Art Gallery. Looking through newspapers on microfilm to find small mentions of your research topic can be exhausting stuff, but if you throw in a quick look at the Women’s Pages of the newspaper you are suddenly transported into the world inhabited by your subject – in this case one ...
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Herb and Onion Bread
My well-worn copy of Anna Thomas’s famous 'Vegetarian Epicure' is dated 1982 but the book was first published ten years earlier, has been reprinted many times and is still in print today. This bread recipe –the first thing I made from it – became an instant favourite. Ms Thomas described it as ‘the fastest yeast bread I know’ and as well as being quick to make it smells wonderful as ...
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Cheese Busters
A very simple and very moreish cheese biscuit. The dough is a rich mixture and although most recipe books suggest rolling it out, I find that maddeningly difficult, so I make it into a roll and slice it into discs. You can vary the seasoning here to suit yourself, by increasing the cayenne, adding some toasted sesame seeds or omitting the curry powder. If you want the biscuits to look ...
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Savoury Pinwheel Scones
Judging by its regular occurrence in community cookbooks, this was a popular type of savoury scone. The base is a plain scone dough, spread with a seasoned cheese and potato mixture, then rolled up and cut into slim spirals for baking. They are fairly substantial and so perhaps more suitable for morning tea than supper. This is based on a recipe from Wiki Paterson, who contributed it to the 1967 ...