Digby Cakes

This was served as part of the banquet course at the Ymir 2023 feast.

Introduction

Rich butter cookies packed with currants, spiced with nutmeg and sherry, baked and finished with a simple sugar glaze. The redaction for this recipe is credited to the late Master Tirloch.

Source

Sir Kenelme Digby, The Closet of the Eminently Learned Sir Kenelme Digbie Kt. Opened (1669)

Take three pound of very fine flower well dryed by the fire, and put to it a pound and a half of loaf Sugar sifted in a very fine sieve and dryed; Three pounds of Currants well washed, and dryed in a cloth and set by the fire; When your flower is well mixed with the Sugar and Currants, you must put in it a pound and a half of unmelted butter, ten spoonfuls of Cream, with the yolks of three new-laid Eggs beat with it, one Nutmeg; and if you please, three spoonfuls of Sack. When you have wrought your paste well, you must put it in a cloth, and set it in a dish before the fire, till it be through warm. Then make them up in little cakes, and prick them full of holes; you must bake them in a quick oven unclosed. Afterwards Ice them over with Sugar. The Cakes should be about the bigness of a hand breadth and thin; of the cise of the Sugar Cakes sold at Barnet.

Discussion

• Digby specifies “Sack,” which in the period refers to a category of fortified wines imported from Spain and the Canary Islands. Modern sherry is the closest readily available equivalent, though the precise character of period sack is a subject that deserves fuller treatment than a recipe note can provide.
• The dough was mixed, rolled to about half an inch thick, cut into cookies, and baked at 350°F for approximately 25 minutes. After baking, they were iced with a simple glaze of sugar dissolved in hot water.
• The cakes should be pricked “full of holes” before baking, as Digby specifies — this prevents puffing and helps them bake evenly as a thin, crisp cake rather than rising into something more bread-like.

Sources