"When he reached his house he met three or four men and women on horseback, very muddy indeed, coming down the drive. Feeling hungry himself, he asked them if they were hungry. They said they were, and he bade them enter. Jimmy took their horses, who seemed to know him. Rhoda took their battered hats, led the women upstairs for hairpins, and presently fed them all with teacakes, poached eggs, anchovy toast and drinks from a coromandel-wood liqueur case which Midmore had never known that he possessed.
'And I will say' said Miss Connie Sperrit, her spurred foot on the fender and a smoking muffin in her whip hand, 'Rhoda does one top-hole. She always did since I was eight'.
'Seven, Miss, was when you began to 'unt,' said Rhoda, setting down more buttered toast."
That passage is from Kipling's story "My Son's Wife", and it inspired our literary afternoon tea fare this month: teacakes, of course. The recipe I used can be found here and you'll note the suggested use of white chocolate instead of beef dripping which I adopted as we have a vegetarian in the family. They have turned out well, and though we have no huntsmen (nor indeed a handy Rhoda to cater for them) they fed a hungry golfer just in from the links.
And should you need any more persuasion to pick up a volume of Kipling's short stories, just read what Lindsay has to say!
I've often read about toasted teacakes, but living in Australia have never come across them. Now I need wonder no longer! They sound delicious, especially with white chocolate.
Posted by: Elizabeth | 13 October 2008 at 10:18 PM