This story shows the food we kept in the Cookery department for my lessons. As you can see, there’s a lot of ingredients to make sweet things like cakes and biscuits.
Cynthia is making a list of all the basic ingredients we need from County Supplies to see us through the autumn term. County Supplies is the purchasing department of our local council where we order things for school, if we have the budget, which I don’t. Food ingredients get delivered to the school kitchens where I’m friendly with the school cook. She’s letting me smuggle in an occasional food order for my lessons as long as it’s not too large. This way, I’m not using up my tiny food budget allocated by the headmaster.
Cynthia’s list:
Large bags of self raising and plain flour to fill two large black plastic bins (about 30 lb)
Bags of sugar – granulated, caster, icing and demerara
Dessicated coconut, golden syrup, cooking chocolate
Cornflour, blancmange powder
Ground almonds, whole almonds, walnuts
Angelica, glacé cherries, sultanas, currants, mixed peel
Gelatine powder, custard powder, jelly crystals
Large tins of red jam,
Stock cubes, rice
Bottles of flavourings – almond, vanilla, rum, peppermint
Bottles of colourings – red, green, blue, yellow
Salt and ground white pepper
Tubs of spices – mixed spice, nutmeg, cloves, ground ginger, allspice, caraway seeds, paprika, cinnamon, curry powder
Tubs of dried herbs – mixed herbs, thyme, rosemary, sage
‘Why do you teach them such unhealthy things?’ my friend Anne asks as we finish off a bottle of wine one night in the wine bar on Hampstead High Street. I feel a flash of shame. Yes, in the past weeks we’ve been making fairy cakes, spotted dick, treacle tart, Swiss rolls, gingerbread, rock buns and those waste of time cream horns. Students who don’t bring any ingredients into my lessons do endless things with red jam – tarts, puffs, roly poly and buns. But she has a point. Most of the time I’m showing them how to rub in, cream or melt fat into flour then add sugar to make crumbles, pastries and cakes. Then give them a lesson on how to be healthier and eat more fruit, vegetables, fish, meat and cheese which we can’t afford to use in the classroom very often. Yes indeed. What am I teaching them?
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