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Hatepe (R.I.P.)
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15/12/2004
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22:11
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Does anyone remember the oatcake man who had a shop at the bottom of Barkerhouse Rd., Nelson and who hawked oat cakes round Kelbrook, Earby and Barlick, mainly in the pubs and clubs for that wonderful drinking man's delicacy "STEW and HARD"????
My father-in-law kept the Stone Trough Pub for over 21 years and the racks in the kitchen were festooned with soft oatcakes drying to make the "hard" for the stew and hard.
The "Stew" was a concoction of meats, pigs feet or a cow's foot and a touch of gelatine, peppers and salt, that were boiled for ever and ladled into basins to "set".
Commercial Travellers would congregate daily at dinnertime for a Gill of ale and a stew and hard and walk out smacking their lips.
My mouth waters at the thought of an oatcake with thick slices of stew and raw onion and a pint of Tetley's bitter beer. Food of the Gods!!!
Unfortunately we cannot get oatcakes in New Zealand, but from time to time I make the "Stew" and eat it with an oat biscuit similar to "hard", the missus thinks I've got summat wrong with me, just shakes her head and says "Who the hell eats that kind of tucker....???"
Aye Hatepe
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andydiamond
Hairy Horologist
424 Posts
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Posted - 17/12/2004 : 18:41
I remember the bookies Bob, never had enough money to go in and chuck it away though.
The main part of the building (still standing) had a large barn door, with a beautiful horses head over the top, and either a date or initials underneath it.
I am surprised some enterprising little ba......d hasn't cleared off with it before now !!
B.J thinks the building could have been a blacksmiths years ago, I thought it was a vet's, or it could have been a stable for visitors to the pub round the corner ? (New Inn)
Our shop was opposite the pub on Leeds Road.
Coming down the hill from the big barn doors, were two small doors into two very small rooms, these were the hotplate bakers premises, small, mean, badly lit and grimy on the outside, which is why I described the place as a "hovel" . .I certainly didn't mean to denigrate two very nice people as I remember them.
Andy.
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 18/12/2004 : 05:38
Backstone baking seems to have gone out of fashion nowadays but someone must still be doing it if you can still get stew and hard. Does anyone know where it's still going on? Crumpets used to be a regular treat at home, the holes were very useful as they held the butter! Must look into this and start baking.......
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Edwin
New Member
2 Posts
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 12:38
I had the pleasure of trying Stew and Hard at Colne Beer Festival last weekend but even the good folk serving it had no idea of how the Stew is made. As I reside in West Midlands opportunities for visiting this particular area of Lancashire are limited so I'd quite like to try my hand at making some myself.Does anybody have any idea of suitable ingredients, proportions, cooking method, cooking time.
Any ideas gratefully recieved.
Edwin.
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Another
Traycle Mine Overseer
6250 Posts
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 13:09
Nedwin, no idea about stew but I know some good recipes with Traycle??? Nolic M.D.
" I'm a self made man who worships his creator"  |
Richard Broughton
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 13:16
Edwin: It's a particular delicacy this which has a taste and look all its own. This is how I'd do it, but the purists might blanche and so if there is a definitive recipe out there I'd really like it.
Get a pound or so of beef - blade, shin, some cheap cut. In a heavy pan, simmer the beef in an inch or so of water. Stew until very tender, about 2 to 3 hours, replacing water as necessary.
Drain, keep the liquid (see later).
Then shred the cooked meat with a fork, until it is the consistency of a thick, stringy paste. Form into a rectangle and weigh down and cool.
You could leave it there if I remember the consistency of the Stew at the Fanny Grey. But to posh it up a bit and go to more like potted meat do this. But I think it's still 'stew' and not 'potted meat', in that it's not smooth - it's stringy
In a pan, melt some butter. Put the melted butter through clean muslin (cheese cloth), to remove the milk solids.
In a bowl, mix the cooked meat with 3/4 of the strained, melted butter. Season with salt, pepper, paprika and nutmeg to taste. Stir in some of the cooking liquid to moisten if you like, to moisten.
Put the mixture in a sterile container (a Kilner jar is good) and top with remaining butter. Seal and chill in the refrigerator until serving.
You can use loads of other meats and rabbit is really good, as well as pork and goose. The French are big on these - they call the results rillets.
And what about Groaty Pudding? As 1st stage above but mix shredded shin (and it must be shin) with groats and let cool. You're doing well if you can get the groats, mind.
Richard Broughton
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 13:55
Richard, I'm off to Stewart Brown's right now. I shall report the results. Actually it sounds just like the way we used to do pressed tongue at the shop at Sough but of course we didn't shred that.
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Edwin
New Member
2 Posts
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 14:21
Richard, thanks. I'll give it a try.
Edwin.
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Richard Broughton
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 15:17
I tell you, it’s such a shame that these sort of things are vanishing. Stew and Hard is a crowing glory of British food – the sort of meals that proper pubs say, should be doing the length and breadth of the land and also, are all too rarely found at home.
You should keep your fingers crossed for me on Wednesdays and Saturdays as, if I drop the lottery, I’m going to come back to Barlick, open a brewery, brew Clarence Tom Bitter and Billycock Dark Mild, open a pub, serve proper British food like Rabbit Pie, Lancashire Hot Pot, Boiled Beef and Carrots and Fish Pie, all with no piped music and where the art of conversation is both practised and encouraged!!
Richard Broughton
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 15:25
Richard, Stewarts wife said I needed shin beef and she also said that it set better with a couple of trotters in it so that's what I have got. The whole lot is simmering in a tightly closed pan designed for pot-roasting, just the trotters, the shin beef and salt and pepper.
I shall report back later......
{now we need a recipe for oatcakes...... I think I can make a fair guess at it but it would be nice to have the real thing.
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Richard Broughton
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 15:33
Stanley - did you get the trotters for free? When they're done, I'd take them out, pull out the bone, tie up with string, roast off for 15 minutes, slice up and eat. Lovely.
I once asked for some calf's feet and veal's shins for natural gelatine when I was boiling up a big gammon steak, which I intended to shread and then layer with parsley using the cooking liquor to set it in a jelly.
They cost they wanted for the feet and shin bones was blooming astronomical! (This was in Sheffield - I reckon my Butcher here, Jennings and Sons, Ewell Road, Surbiton - go there if you're in the area anyone - would chuck it in for next to nowt)
I used gelatine sheets instead - it worked but I felt I hadn't done it right.
Richard Broughton
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 18:31
I think two trotters was 20p. However, the report:
The Stew.
I cut up one and a half pounds of shin beef just as I would for a stew. Popped the lot plus two trotters chopped in two in a pan with a tight lid that's meant for pot-roasting. {I reckon a casserole and cooking in the oven would be good]. I put enough water in to come half way up the meat, gave it a good dose of pepper and salt and put the lot on the stove. Brought it to a brisk boil and then turned it down so that it was a nice slow boil. 3 hours later and after one small top up of water, the meat was cooked tender and the gravy level was about one third the way up the meat. I fished the trotters out and Jack gets them. [Another time I'll leave them whole and follow Richard's tip]. I didn't need to shred the meat I just mashed it with a potato masher and it broke down and absorbed all the gravy. It smells so good that I haven't put any spices in. I had a screw top plastic tub and have put the meat in there, pressed it down with the potato masher, screwed the top on and popped it in the fridge to set. It smells and tastes like very high quality corned beef. I recon it's going to make a good sandwich later on home made bread! I finished up with about a pint of beef in volume and funnily enough is one and a half pounds.
Now for the oat cakes!
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Hatepe (R.I.P.)
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Posted - 09/02/2005 : 22:51
Morning to you stew and hard lovers,
I suppose there are many ways of making the stew, especially during the WW11 days when meat was scarce. My Ma-in-law Annie Wilkinson at the Stone Trough made good stew in a pressure cooker, I think she had a basic recipe and just added what meat she could get either off the ration or what someone brought round to the back door.
Stew of course is a form of brawn, the best brawn being made with a pig's head and belly pork, with the trotters or a cow heel put in for the gelatine, but old Annie obviously had a source of supply of sheep meat and sheep's heads, trotters and cow heels, but she also added gelatine in liquid form to the meat once it was pressed down into a bowl (not too tightly), then frozen and brought out and thawed when needed.
Over my years in NZ I have made numerous concoctions of "stew", but using pork has been the best results for both sammies and for putting on oat style biscuits with raw onion.
Your beef "stew" sounds great Stanley, but if it isn't quite what you wanted, try using it in a Meat and Potato pie, the result is scrumptious.
I have tried to make oatcake, I know the basics are pin oatmeal with a small amount of flour and water, but I seem to think that the guy who made oatcakes in Nelson used either egg powder or beaten egg to hold the mixture together, not having a hot plate I have used a cast iron skillet and lightly greased the bottom of it, but I cannot make the floppy oatcake that needs to go on the clothes rack to dry.
Still if there is someone out there with a recipe, please let us all have it.
Aye Hatepe
R.W.King |
Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 10/02/2005 : 05:53
It tastes as good as it looks, no spices, just the meat and salt and pepper. I shall attack the oatcakes this morning.....
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
mporter
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Posted - 10/02/2005 : 06:45
Save some for me....it looks good.
Margaret Porter
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Cathy
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Posted - 10/02/2005 : 08:33
Oh Dear! I'm trying to work out if it's a good thing or a pity that I don't eat red meat....
There must be something else that the Oatcakes go with....Any suggestions??
Edited by - Cathy on 10 Feb 2005 08:34:56
All thru the fields and meadows gay .... Enjoy
Take Care...Cathy |
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Stew and Hard
