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Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Prune Torte -Grandma's Kitchen creativity honoured

Grandma's kitchen creativity honoured

By Donna Gray, For Neighbours January 8, 2009



A few weeks back, we announced a cookbook contest featuring memories and recipes from your grandmothers.
Many readers responded with lovely memories, as well as tried-and-true dishes that stand the test of time and taste.
Our first winner, Marilyn Kennedy, wrote a lovely memoir of her grandmother Anna's culinary legacy. Her family hails from Manitoba, where she says favourite recipes were passed from one generation to another.
"It's part of the tradition growing up on the Prairies," she says. "My mom made a cookie made with lard and sandwiched with a date filling which I recognized as my grandmother's recipe. I loved them hot."
A second recipe is a vine torte, also called an Icelandic cake, given to her by a friend in Winnipeg.
"As I was making the cake and rolling out all the pieces of the torte and placing them on cookie sheets to bake, I suddenly had a memory of my grandmother making this cake along with the delectable smell of these cardamom-flavoured cakes as they came out of the oven. It was the same recipe as my grandmother's, but she called it a prune torte."
Kennedy has included the recipe for the filling as well. Stay tuned for next week's winner. Thanks again to Whitecap books for donating the Purity and Red Roses Flour cookbooks ( www.whitecap.ca).
Prune Torte1 cup (250 mL) butter
2 cups (500 mL) sugar
4 beaten eggs 2 tbsp (30 mL)milk
4 cups (1kg)siftedflour
1 tsp (5 mL) cardamom
2 tsp (10 mL) baking powder
Cream butter and sugar, add the egg and milk. In another bowl, sift together two cups of flour, cardamom and baking powder. Add dry ingredients to first mixture, Take remaining flour and gradually add until you have a dough stiff enough to roll. Divide dough into seven to eight equal parts. Cut out the dough on the cookie sheet using an 8-or 9-inch cake pan as the template. Bake at 375° for 15-to-20 minutes or until golden brown. Cool and layer with prune fillings.
Prune filling
1 lb (450 g) of prunes (boiled and mashed)
1/2 cup (125 mL) of sugar (optional or to taste)
1 -2 tbsp (15-30 mL) of rum
Mix together and put prune filling between the layers of cake. This cake needs to mellow. The cookie base becomes soft and moist and easy to cut. Once it is mellow, this cake freezes well. Cut in small pieces as it's very rich.



Got a recipe to share or a request for a special dish? E-mail me at recipebox@shaw.ca or fax to 403-235-7379 and mark attention: recipe box. Include your name, address, phonenumber and e-mail in the information. You can also snail mail it to recipe box, Calgary Herald Neighbours, box 2400, Station M, Calgary, Alberta, T2P 0W8.

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