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Currant Loaf
To a quart of flour add a quarter pound of butter, and a half cup of sugar, rubbing in well. Scald a pint of milk and cool, adding a half pint of cold water. Dissolve in this a small yeast cake or tablet and add to the flour (making a very soft, thin dough), letting rise until light, which will be under three hours. Add two or three beaten eggs and a cup and a half to two cups of currants, floured, stirring and setting to rise again in a greased cake-pan. In two hours bake in temperate oven for about an hour.
T° CHAPTER XI THE OLIVE (Olea Europæa) O STATE that the olive has from an unremembered limit of time been the symbol of wisdom, peace, chastity, and victory, is to concentrate volumes of panegyrics. And there are truly ages of experience eloquently suggested in the very repression of intensity of colouring possessed by the silent, dignified, mystic-looking graygreen trees which live on indefinitely through centuries. Typifying the fat of those lands "flowing with milk and honey" which across the seas stretch back into impenetrable dimness, and its fruit literally giving it forth, its leaves resemble rather the muscular tissues of ancient Greek youths whose graceful bodies were not permitted to accumulate unnecessary or soft flesh, for these slim, somewhat willow-like leaves are apparently almost devoid of sap, firm to the point of stiffness in texture. The olive of European and Asiatic countries, now also thoroughly a product of American-Californian soil, growing, too, even on south walls in parts of southern England, is known to the world through its oil, its pickled and dried fruits.
The first is often adulterated with those excellent oils of the cottonseed and peanut (which should be allowed to appear under their own names, however) and poppy and other oils, but the adulteration is the more easily detected that olive oil congeals at a higher temperature than the other oils. It is the fleshy part of the fruit instead of the seed which gives the oil and of this there are several grades, the virgin oil, or best grade, being carefully pressed from I22
A soft, enriched yeast batter bread rather than a kneaded loaf — expect something closer to a thick, sticky dough than a shapeable one. The measurements are old-fashioned but all convert cleanly.
- The currants are dried, not freshZante currants are tiny dried grapes, not the fresh red or black currants of the berry family. Use dried currants or, at a pinch, chopped raisins; fresh currants would wreck the dough with juice.
- UnitsA quart of flour is 4 cups, roughly 1 lb or 500 g. A pint of milk is 2 cups, a half pint of water 1 cup, a quarter pound of butter 1 stick or 115 g.
- The yeast cakeA "small yeast cake or tablet" is compressed fresh yeast of about 0.6 oz. Substitute one packet, 2 1/4 teaspoons, of active dry yeast, proofed in the warm milk-and-water mixture.
- Scalding the milkScalding raw milk was standard practice, and is usually explained as neutralising something in raw milk that slackened dough. With pasteurised milk it is generally held unnecessary; simply warm it and the water together to about 105F before adding the yeast.
- "Temperate oven"Temperate here means moderate, roughly 325-350F. An hour at that heat suits a large enriched loaf. Test with a thermometer — the centre should read 190-200F.
- Flouring the currantsTossing the fruit in a spoonful of the measured flour keeps it suspended in what is a very slack dough. Skip it and the currants will settle to the bottom of the pan.
- Rising times"Under three hours" and "two hours" reflect cool kitchens and slower yeast. In a modern warm room, judge by doubling in bulk instead of the clock — the first rise may take 60-90 minutes, the second 45-60.
- Pan and yieldA "greased cake-pan" most likely means a deep round or square tin rather than a modern loaf pan, though either will work. The batch is large — roughly enough for one big deep tin or two smaller ones.
Currant loaf belongs to the long English tradition of enriched yeast breads studded with dried fruit — the same family as bara brith, barmbrack and the plainer tea breads baked for Sunday or for company. The fruit in question is the Zante currant, a small seedless dried grape whose name comes by way of Old French from Corinth, the Greek port through which the trade historically ran. That its yeast is measured as "a small yeast cake or tablet" suggests the recipe belongs to the era when compressed baker's yeast was sold fresh in foil-wrapped cakes at the grocer.