Honey Cakes | The Hobbit
This is what he promised to do for them. He would provide ponies for each of them, and a horse for Gandalf, for their journey to the forest, and he would lade them with food to last them for weeks with care, and packed so as to be as easy as possible to carry - nuts, flour, sealed jars of dried fruits, and red earthenware pots of honey, and twice baked cakes that would keep good for a long time, and on a little of which they could march far.
The Hobbit
J.R.R Tolkien
It is maybe my dream to go and live in a tiny hobbit hole built into the side of a hill, and spend my time gardening, baking and generally enjoying life. I’ve been called a hobbit many times by people and to be fair, I can identify with the delights of a cozy home and multiple breakfasts.
I read The Hobbit for the first time when I was quite young, attempting to follow it up with The Lord of the Rings. That one was quite not as successfully read - I definitely read it, but understood nothing.
I definitely want to revisit the dinner Bilbo is forced to relinquish to the dwarves when they first interrupt his quiet life. But, I was gifted this incredible honeycomb cake tin for Christmas and wanted something to test out with it - it came out so beautiful and now I want to make every cake in it.
These honey cakes aren’t quite what I think would have been packed by Beorn for the dwarves journey. Bryt from In Literature has created what is probably the most accurate representation of them, more of a biscotti, hard cake that could be packed and would last for days. Mine is much more of a - eat it fresh from the oven in a cosy hobbit hole, kind of cake.
*Note: I don’t use honey in my cooking as it is not plant based. I generally use replacements like rice malt syrup or maple syrup which are just as good. If you do use honey, reduce the amount by about 20g, as it is quite a bit sweeter than rice malt syrup.
Honey Cakes
Ingredients
250g plain flour
200g butter
100g muscovado sugar
200g rice malt syrup OR honey *see note
1 tsp bi-carb soda
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
2 tsp ground ginger
180ml milk
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
Oil or butter, to grease the cake tin
20g cornmeal
Syrup
140g rice malt syrup OR honey
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp ground ginger
20g muscovado sugar
Sea salt
Preheat the oven to 180C, and grease your cake tin. This can be be done in muffin tins also - but reduce the baking time by ten minutes and keep an eye at them so they don’t overcook.
Combine the milk and apple cider vinegar together and leave for around 5 minutes to curdle into a buttermilk.
Heat the butter, muscovado sugar, and rice malt syrup/honey on a low heat - until the butter has melted and the sugar has dissolved in.
Combine the flour, bi-carb soda, baking powder, ground spices, adding in the butter mixture and buttermilk and combining until all lumps of flour have been mixed in.
Before you pour the cake batter into the tin, sprinkle the cornmeal across the greased surface of the tin - this will help have it not stick - and also look quite nice when it comes out of the oven.
Bake for around 30 minutes, checking it after 25 minutes with a skewer to see if the middle is cooked.
While the cake is baking, combine all the syrup ingredients into a small saucepan and cook on a low heat until the sugar has dissolved into the rice malt syrup/honey.
Pour the syrup across the cake to serve - I served mine with an oat cream and it was delicious!