24th August: St Bartholomew Fair

- and thoughts about honey

Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow..'

From ' The Lake Isle of Innisfree' by W. B. Yeats (1865-1939)

We had a family expression when I was a kid - an untidy room was “like Frodingham Fair…” The sleepy East Yorkshire village of Frodingham probably hasn’t had a fair since goodness knows when, but given that the memory lingered on in the expression, its fair must have been marked by exuberant merrymaking.

Today is the Feast of St Bartholomew, the Patron Saint of tanners and leather workers – a fact not missed by Ben Jonson in his play ‘Bartholomew Fair’ first performed about 1614. From 1133 until 1855, St Bartholomew’s Fair was held near Smithfield Market in London and other parts of the country had Bartholomew Fairs too. They became a byword for raucous behaviour, fights, drunkenness and fairground food - notably pig roasts, pears and gingerbread. The London fair was particularly notorious for pickpockets and the prostitutes - the latter being called ‘soiled doves’ who plied their trade in tents erected in the edge of the fair or on nearby Cock Lane…..hmmm

In late August as the agricultural cycle slowed, the fairs were an opportunity for people to let their hair down after three months of hard labour. People from all walks of life went to have fun, or watch others doing so. John Evelyn and John Locke both mention it and Pepys describes how that he came across a crowd waiting for the appearance of the King's mistress (one of them anyway) Lady Castelmaine, who shared her affections with Jacob Hall, a common rope dancer.

There are lots of pictures of Bartholomew Fair (this one is Thomas Rowlandson) including a famous one by Hogarth of Tiddy Doll the gingerbread seller who moved from his usual spot in London's Haymarket (a famous red light district) to Smithfield for the duration of the Fair. In1840 the new puritans of Victorian society began to clamp down on the activities at the fair, so much so that by 1855 it ceased to exist and a 700 year old tradition was no more.

Gingerbread as a traditional fair food, was made in a number of different ways. It was sometimes cut into fantastical shapes which were then gilded or stamped with an image appropriate to the occasion or the season, (as in ‘gilding the gingerbread’ - an expression for unnecessary excess). Gingerbread could also be a deep sticky cake or a hard biscuit made with breadcrumbs and honey, which when sold in broken pieces and called a ‘snap’. Whichever sort of gingerbread it was, it had by law to be made by a bona fide gingerbread maker, and it was sold on the streets of London from hot carts until well into the nineteenth century.

The 24th August is also the traditional day for bee keepers to harvest honey, the bees are dozing in the summer heat having made the honey and filled their combs.

Here's my recipe for Beekeeper's Cake. The recipe I used is similar to a traditional Jewish cake called 'Lekash’, which is often made for Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. I've adapted it from from Denise Phillip’s book ‘New Flavours of the Jewish Table’. I’ve gingered up the spice mix a bit, so it is gingerbread by another name really.....

Beekeeper's Cake

175g plain flour

75g soft brown sugar

2 teaspoons ground ginger

1teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

100ml vegetable oil

225g clear honey

Zest of 1 orange

3 eggs

100ml orange juice

Method:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 180 C/350 F/ Gas mark 4.

2. Grease and line a 2lb loaf tin or a 7" loose bottomed cake tin

3. In a large bowl combine the flour, sugar, ginger, cinnamon and bicarbonate of soda.

4. Put the oil, honey, zest of orange, eggs and juice in another bowl and beat together until smooth.

5. Fold all together gently until all the flour is combined

6. Pour the cake mixture into the prepared tin.

7. Bake for about 50 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the middle of the cake mixture comes out clean.

8. Leave to cool in the tin, then turn out and wrap tightly in foil. Store for 2-3 days before serving to allow the flavours to mature.

Decorate with glace icing or edible glitter. I printed the bee stencil out from the internet, cut it out, laid it on the cake and then stippled it with edible gold powder.

I often make gingerbread at Christmas, gild it with gold leaf and give it away as presents. It’s also a good winter pudding, served warm with pear compote. The combination of pears and ginger is a marriage made in the middle ages and still going strong.

Joan Trash: 'Why what stuff are they made on? Nothing but what's wholesome I assure you.'

Leatherhead: 'Yes stale bread, rotten eggs, musty ginger and dead honey...'

Joan Trash: 'Buy any gingerbread, gilt gingerbread!'

From Bartholomew Fair by Ben Jonson (1572-1637)