There was nothing quite like Pancake Day when I was a child waiting patiently in line to see if the next one Mum had finished cooking was for me. No sooner was it tossed and turned out onto the Hornsea pottery ‘Heirloom’ plate, squirted with lemon and sprinkled with sugar than it was devoured to reveal the potter’s design once more leaving a sugary top lip to be licked clean. Then, I resumed my place in line by the cooker and a hot and flustered Mum anticipating seconds or thirds or fourths for that matter.
In our house this special custom was not the only event in the preparation for Lent. Grandad was a Darlington born farmer, though now living in North Yorkshire, I could only presume his week-long preparations for Lent hailed from his neck of the woods, as none of my school friends had heard of our family traditions and to me this was something to be proud of.
The Monday before Shrove Tuesday was Grandad’s ‘Collop Monday’, now there’s a good word, it has to be up there with ‘wazzock’ doesn’t it? It was celebrated in our house by another fine meal, this time it was all about using up the last bits of meat prior to fasting for Lent, they were chopped up and cooked with eggs in a frying pan like an omelette.
Then the day after Shrove Tuesday, of course, is known as Ash Wednesday, when traditionally in Catholic and other Christian faiths, the ashes from burning the previous year’s palm crosses were applied to the faithful’s foreheads in the shape of a cross, which was seen as a public expression of faith and penance. I don’t recall this event but my family had a special dish to mark the day, ‘Ash Wednesday Fritters’, and these delightful delicacies we still enjoy today. They are a yeast based teacake like specimen, full of dried fruit and cooking apples and fried in butter, again in the name of using up the rich ingredients in preparation for Lent. The funny thing is we seemed to eat more than ever at this time and I certainly don’t remember going hungry for 40 days, this memoir could actually be a guide to ‘A Foodies Way to Fast’. I can hear Grandad now saying, “Belly ‘ods back up” or “strength goes in at mouth”. Is there any wonder I never make slimmer of the week, obviously “way a wo browt up.” Grandad always called me ‘Latle un’ as I was the youngest he used to say I was as ‘andy as a dish clowt’ and of this title no one could have been prouder. In my book no finer compliment could I have been paid, such was the greatness of the man.
At the grand age of 81 my Mum still makes a few of these fritters, even now though nothing like as many. She was the youngest of 7 and as a child all my Uncles and Aunties used to call in on Ash Wednesday and Mum would select a handful of fritters from the heap on the kitchen table wrap them up and give them to each of her siblings. We all have the recipe and will continue the tradition into the next generation, this year they were made by my great niece Keira, who is Grandad’s great, great granddaughter.
I also have a vague memory of the next day, Thursday being labelled Bloody Thursday and black pudding being on the menu, any excuse in our house for a feast. Not just ordinary black pudding but the home made variety from pig killing day. A subject which deserves a whole blog to itself!! Not much culinary deviance occurred throughout Lent for our lot except we always had plenty! Then came Good Friday, of course, or Fishy Friday as it was known to me, when we had fish in parsley sauce with mashed potatoes and peas, at last some family abstinence, as we went without meat for the day. Grandad took us on a nature walk Good Friday too and told us all about the fauna and flora that Mother Nature had laid on for our delight. I loved hearing the lapwing’s call or ‘Teerfits’ as Grandad called them and the distinctive Curlew’s shriek, that still makes me feel that all in the world is well. Grandad knew every grass, flower and tree and his mission was to share his knowledge with the next generation and I was a willing sponge.
Lent passed us by in a plentiful kind of way and I was always excited at the thought of Easter Celebrations. Easter Saturday was spent preparing hard boiled eggs for the Easter Sunday ‘Booling’ that took place, rolling the eggs down the big hill in front of the house to see whose egg remained intact. We went to great lengths to decorate the eggs placing delicate gorse flowers on the shell then wrapping them in onion skins before boiling them. Is there ever a time in the calendar when gorse isn’t in flower? It just seems to whatever the season. I can remember the excitement of waiting for the boiled eggs to cool so that the pattern could be revealed by removing their onion layered jackets. Sometimes we used beetroot to boil them with too which made a lovely purple colour on the shells. Each of us eager to have made the best design, but there were no losers on Easter Sunday and as you would expect, the tea table groaned with yet another feast.
