Читать книгу The Taste of Britain - Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall - Страница 140

The use of saffron in sweet breads and buns is now thought typical of Cornwall. Formerly the spice was more widely used in British cookery, and was quite often called for in cakes of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (Glasse, 1747). Thereafter, it is found very rarely, although it crops up here and there in recipes collected in Northumberland. Its chief survival was in Cornwall at the other end of the country. It may have lingered here because saffron was still grown. Carolyn Martin (1993) notes that ‘various wills and documents refer to “saffron meadows’”, and there is a reference to saffron growing at Launcells, near Bude, in the 1870s.

Originally, saffron buns were eaten with clotted cream on Good Friday. The saffron, an expensive spice, is now sometimes replaced with yellow colouring. David (1977) observed that in the past, saffron filaments were infused to produce the colour and they were not strained out before the water was mixed with the other ingredients. She also noted that eggs were not usually added, although the recipe quoted below, collected recently, does include them.