I was born in Devon but from the ages of four to nine I spent all my holidays with my grandparents in Cornwall, and many of my recipes are of what I remember from those days. Farming had not changed greatly from the days of Ross and Demelza. The plough was pulled by two horses instead of oxen, and I well remember walking behind my cousins and getting my shoes filled with small stones and earth. Flocks of seagulls followed behind feasting on worms and grubs turned up by the plough.
Eggs and milk and cream were plentiful and were much used in cooking. Pasties, saffron cake, splits and cream are known to many, but some of the pasties sold today bear little resemblance to the ones my grandmother made.
Of course there were no such things as refrigerators or deep freezers, so food was eaten as it came into season. To me that is just as important now as it ever was and I have little liking for strawberries at Christmas. Pickling in salt was really the only way of keeping food fresh, brisket and belly pork being the most common meats to salt.
Spring meant lamb and new potatoes with fresh mint and parsley. Spring chickens were hatched about April and were ready for the table in eight weeks’ time. Hens, too, were individual: White Wyandots were good layers but ‘flighty’ birds; Plymouth Rock, a black and white speckled hen, were showy creatures; but the best of all for all purposes were the Rhode Island Reds – good layers, good table birds and good mothers. Sometimes the farmer’s wife would sit a broody Rhode Island Red on ten duck eggs. When the eggs hatched the hen did not seem to notice any difference in her brood until they came to the farm pond, when to her horror the ‘chicks’ took to the water.
Elder bloomed and the flowers were picked for wine. This was not quite as potent as elderberry, which came later in the year. Sloes were plentiful – lovely to look at but sour to eat – and these too were much used for wine. Summer brought strawberries, followed by raspberries then loganberries. We did not eat pork from May until September.
This was a busy time – the corn was cut and stacked around the fields in stocks. All day long the men worked reaping and stacking; the women would come out at dinnertime with large baskets covered with white cloths. A pasty for everybody, followed by saffron buns and yeast cake, washed down with large cups of hot strong tea. There was another break about five for more tea with splits and butter and perhaps some seedy buns (carraway seeds), then the work went on until dusk. During August the blackcurrants were ready; picking them was a tedious task, but my grandfather had a great many bushes and they all had to be picked, topped and tailed before they were ready for jam making. A glass of blackcurrant tea with a slice of lemon was very good for a cold on the chest.
Blackberries abounded and we ate as many as we picked, but they were considered no good after 15th September because the devil had got into them – a practical superstition because by then the summer flies were working on them.
Our next treat was mushrooming. Early morning was the best time, and you could almost watch the little pink button ones growing in the dewy grass. When cooking them fresh-picked with bacon for breakfast my grandmother would drop an old silver spoon in the dish: if it became discoloured there was a bad one.
My grandmother went to her butcher once a week on market day – Thursday – usually at about 4.30 in the afternoon. There would be several sides of beef hanging up in the shop and she would inspect each one, always asking where the beef had come from. If she did not like the farm or farmer she would not buy from that carcass. Once it was chosen, the butcher would stick a skewer in the carcass with her name on it. She would also usually buy a tongue and leave this to be pickled.
All larders were on the north side of the house or farm, with stone or Delabole slate floors and shelves of slate around the walls. A large wooden table stood in the middle and hooks hung from the ceiling with smoked hams. Large earthenware jars stood around the floor to hold salt pork and occasionally a piece of salt beef brisket. What could be nicer on a cold November day than boiled beef, dumplings and carrots?
The ovens were built into the wall around the large open hearth. They were made of clay and had an iron door and were heated by being filled with large pieces of furze or gorse bushes which were then lighted: it usually took about half an hour to get the oven to its proper heat. The ashes were then raked out and in would go either bread or a dozen pasties. I do not remember ever seeing a piece of meat roasted in these particular ovens, but it was on this farm we had the famous ‘fowl’ pies! (See here.)
Cornwall abounds now with shops selling Cornish Piskies and such things. My grandmother was pure Cornish and lived to be ninety-one. She had some superstitions, but I never heard her talk at any time in her life of fairies or ‘little people’. Many of her superstitions, in fact, like the one about the blackberries, were based on sound common sense. She certainly would not cross the moors at night – because you couldn’t see where the bogs were, and any cow or man who wandered into one of them could disappear without trace. She would not have blankets washed in May, because ‘it washed one of the family away’. But May month is tricky anyhow; one day hot, another cold, so why change into summer clothes or discard the winter blankets? Among her less logical superstitions was to forbid the bringing of May blossom or hawthorn into the house; she would not have new shoes put on the table; she hated peacocks’ feathers and would not have them near her because they had ‘eyes’ in them.
Altogether she was a very practical woman, with an earthiness that comes to those who never lose touch with the essentials of a simple life. She also had a great sense of propriety. Even after I was married and had had children, she still considered there were certain things I was too young to know.
All the money my grandfather made he automatically turned over to her. She had the business head, and he was happy to leave the family finances to her. Throughout her life she kept seven purses, into which she put a small amount of money every month. These were labelled in her own mind for various calls on her pocket. One was for rates, one for mortgage payments, one for repairs, one for clothing, one for masonic dues. The sixth was for doctors and the seventh for death. When she died, there was £90 in the last purse.