A Pantry Chocolate Cake for Mrs. Hatchett

Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.

It’s Saturday just after midday and we are behind the green baize door that leads from the dining room into the servant’s part of Lettice’s flat. We are in Edith’s preserve, the very modern and up-to-date 1920s kitchen. Edith hears the gentle squeak of the hinges of the green baize door. She looks up from her pride and joy, the gas stove, where she is about to withdraw the boiling kettle to make herself a cup of tea and sees her mistress in the kitchen. Much to Edith’s consternation, her mistress has the most annoying habit of neglecting to use the electric servants’ bells installed by the builders, and visits Edith in what she considers, her kitchen. Frowning, the maid thinks to herself, “Anyone would think she was a shop girl rather than the daughter of a peer!”

“Oh Edith! Edith!” gasps Lettice dramatically. “Greek tragedy!”

“Whatever is it, Miss?” Edith asks, still frowning as she doubts it is all as bad as her mistress suggests.

“Edith, I’ve just had a call from Mrs. Hatchett.”

“Yes Miss?” Edith answers, having no idea who Mrs. Hatchett is, or what this Mrs. Hatchett means to Lettice.

“Well. She is coming here today, at four, to talk about me redecorating her house. Do we have any fresh cake ready?”

“Well, no Miss: only half a Dundee cake. Will that do?”

“Oh no Edith! Not for Mrs. Hatchett. We need something… fresh.” Lettice ponders. “Well, could you just pop around the corner to Harrods and buy a cake? I’ll get you some extra money for it.”

“No, Miss!” Edith scoffs.

Lettice looks up at her maid with wide eyes. “Why ever not Edith?”

“It’s Saturday, Miss! Harrods won’t be open.”

“Oh,” Lettice frowns and thinks again.

“And don’t suggest the local grocer’s,” Edith pipes up quickly as if reading her mistress’ mind. “Mr. Willson is closed too!”

“Blast!” Lettice mutters and starts to gnaw at her painted thumbnail as she leans against Edith’s deal kitchen table.

“But I can whip up my Mum’s old ‘pantry chocolate cake’, Miss. I have all the ingredients right here. It’s lovely and moist but looks a bit plain. However, if I dust it with a bit of confectioners’ sugar, it looks very nice.”

“Oh! Oh, would you Edith? That sounds simply spiffing!” Lettice gasps in delight. She throws her arms around Edith’s neck, much to the other woman’s consternation, and beams one of her winning smiles. “Oh you are a brick!”

Lettice flutters out of the kitchen the way she came, much to Edith’s relief.

“Spiffing! Humph!” Edith mutters with a snort. She busies herself taking out a copper pot and then fetching flour and sugar canisters, butter, milk and eggs from the food safe, a jar of Golden Shred orange marmalade, salt and some Cadbury’s Original dark chocolate from the pantry. With everything laid out on her kitchen table, Edith’s memory of how to bake her mother’s cake comes to the front of her mind.

“First of all, beat two eggs,” she tells herself.

This year the FFF+ Group have decided to have a weekly challenge called “Snap Happy”. A different theme chosen by a member of the group each week, and the image is to be posted on the Monday of the week.

This week the theme, “egg” was chosen by Lisa, red stilletto.

Eggs are a vital part of cake baking. Goodness knows how they made cakes during the war without them! Edith’s well set out ingredient selection, which does indeed make up the genuine ingredients list for the recipe for “Pantry Chocolate Cake” (a lovely moist and rich chocolate cake from my Great Grandmother’s cooks’ recipe book of ‘fail safe recipes’), is a little different to what you might think, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures from my miniatures collection, some of which come from my own childhood.

Fun things to look for in this tableaux include:

The eggs, including the those broken in the bowl are all 1:12 artisan miniatures with amazing attention to detail.

On Edith’s deal table is a Cornishware white and blue striped bowl which holds the eggs and also one of her Cornishware cannisters. Cornishware is a striped kitchenware brand trademarked to and manufactured by T.G. Green & Co Ltd. Originally introduced in the 1920s and manufactured in Church Gresley, Derbyshire, it was a huge success for the company and in the succeeding 30 years it was exported around the world. The company ceased production in June 2007 when the factory closed under the ownership of parent company, The Tableshop Group. The range was revived in 2009 after T.G. Green was bought by a trio of British investors.

The tall Deftware jug containing milk and the plate with a block of butter on it are part of a 1:12 size miniature porcelain dinner set which sits on the dresser just out of shot to the right of the table. The block of butter comes from a small silver set that I have had since I was given it as part of a seventh birthday present, and it belongs beneath a butter dish. Fellow Flickr photographer and miniature enthusiast ursula.valtiner and I both have the same silver set with the same yellow block of butter in the butter dish!

Next to the Cornishware sugar canister and the copper pot is a jar of Golden Shred Orange Marmalade. Golden Shred orange marmalade still exists today and is a common household brand both in Britain and Australia. It is produced by Robertson’s. Robertson\'s Golden Shred recipe perfected since 1874 is a clear and tangy orange marmalade, which according to their modern day jars is “perfect for Paddington’s marmalade sandwiches”. Robertson\'s marmalade dates back to 1874 when Mrs. Robertson started making marmalade in the family grocery shop in Paisley, Scotland.

In front of the bowl of eggs, the whisk and butter is a wrapped block of Cadbury’s Original dark chocolate. Cadbury, like Robertson’s, is a household name known around the world. Established in 1824 in Birmingham by Quaker John Cadbury, they began by selling tea, coffee and drinking chocolate. John Cadbury developed the business with his brother Benjamin, followed by his sons Richard and George. George developed the Bourneville estate, a model village designed to give the company\'s workers improved living conditions. Dairy Milk chocolate, introduced in 1905, used a higher proportion of milk within the recipe compared with rival products. By 1914, the chocolate was the company\'s best-selling product. Cadbury, alongside Rowntree’s and Fry’s, were the big three British confectionery manufacturers throughout much of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. Cadbury was granted its first Royal Warrant from Queen Victoria in 1854. It has been a holder of a Royal Warrant from Queen Elizabeth II in 1955. Cadbury merged with Schweppes in 1969 and was then purchased by Kraft Foods in 2010.

Edith’s Windsor chair is a hand-turned 1:12 artisan miniature which came from America. Unfortunately, the artist did not carve their name under the seat, but it is definitely an unmarked artisan piece.

In the background you can see a very modern and up-to-date 1920s gas stove. It would have been expensive to instal at the time, and it would have been the cook’s or maid’s pleasure to cook on and in. It would have included a thermostat for perfect cooking and without the need of coal, it was much cleaner to feed, use and clean. It is not unlike those made by the Roper Stove Company in the 1920s. The Roper Stove Company previously named the Florence-Wehrle Company among other names, was founded in 1883. Located in Newark, Ohio, the company was once the largest stove producer in the world. Today, the Roper Stove Company is a brand of Whirlpool.

On the bench in the background is a toaster: a very modern convenience for a household even in the early 1920s, but essential when there was no longer a kitchen range on which to toast the bread. Although toasters had been readily available since the turn of the century, they were not commonplace in British kitchens until well after the Great War in the late 1930s. Next to the toaster is a biscuit barrel painted in the style of English ceramic artist Clarice Cliff which is a hand painted 1:12 miniature made by Karen Ladybug Miniatures in England. It contains its own selection of miniature hand-made chocolate biscuits! Next to that stands a bread crock.

Taken on: September 16, 2020

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Camera: Canon DIGITAL IXUS 80 IS, f/2.8, 1/30 sec, 6.2mm, ISO 320 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Canon DIGITAL IXUS 80 IS
Aperture:	f/2.8
Exposure Time:	0.033 sec (1/30)
Focal Length:	6.2mm
ISO:	320
Exposure Bias:	0 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	sRGB
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