CAKES AND SUNLIGHT

One of the things which is nearly impossible to find in the United States is an old fashioned ontbijt koek. Which, if you are reading this, you may very well not know.

Ontbijt koek (“breakfast cake”) is a type of semi-sweet ryebread cake flavoured with cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and candied citrus peel (succade).
The Groninger version, called an 'ole weef kewk' ("Oal Wief Koek" - old hag's cake), is flavoured only with anise and is soft enough that even a toothless crone can enjoy it.

The nearest equivalent, in the English-speaking world, is lekach, though in fact ontbijt koek is related to both the Flemish honingkoek and the French pain d'épices.


It is a profoundly mediaeval product. But fortunately it has been updated - and is now sold in nice uniform weights and packages wherever there are sufficient Dutch people.
As I have never made it myself, I shall abstain from giving a recipe.

You can buy it off the internet. Just hunt around for any outfit that promises Dutch comestibles by mail order. I have no recommendations, as I seldom purchase food electronically.


WHY THEN?

The only reason I even remembered ontbijt koek is because a tobacco I'm smoking right now reminded me of an early morning long ago in summer. No one else was up yet, I was wide awake and not hung-over. I fixed myself some coffee and a large slice of ontbijt koek with butter, then went and sat in the courtyard, where the sparrows in the rose trellises provided the only noise to be heard at that time of day. After eating, I lit up. What I'm smoking today is by no means the same blend, but has some characteristics which are very similar. And the sun on the flat roof of the building next door evoked the brightness of the light against the wall back then.

[The tobacco is McClelland Tobacco Company's Orient 996 - Vintage 2007. Described as: "A very special blend of sugary bright Virginia and aged, mellow red Virginia, seasoned with a good amount of rare Yenidje and touch of Syrian Latakia. Ready to smoke, but designed to age beautifully."
Yep, that's what the tin blurb says. Prolix, eh? But it's actually a very nice product, albeit not particularly top-heavy on the Orientals. A fine ribbony cut, and a fermented smell reminiscent of English and Scottish tobaccos still common in the nineteen-seventies.]


I think I'll look up recipes and experiment. When I have satisfactory results, I'll post them. Until then, just move along - nothing to see here.