Today is St. David's Day, so named for the patron saint of Wales. Because the Dad side in me loves to celebrate and the Mom side in me loves tradition and the Jones that I married is Welsh, we decided to celebrate with Welsh traditions. (See what I did there?)
First of all, Dragon Daddy bought Princess Pie some daffodils as they are the national flower of Wales. We would have sent her to school with one in her hair, but she was sick. She lit up when her daddy gave her the plant.
Then, I decided to make Welsh cakes. I found a great recipe.
Ingredients
225g/8oz self-raising flour, sieved
110g/4oz (preferably Welsh) salted butter
1 egg
handful of sultanas
milk, if needed
85g/3oz caster sugar
extra butter, for greasingPreparation method
Rub the fat into the sieved flour to make breadcrumbs. Add the sugar, dried fruit and then the egg. Mix to combine, then form a ball of dough, using a splash of milk if needed.
Roll out the pastry until it is a 5mm/¼in thick and cut into rounds with a 7.5-10cm/3-4in fluted cutter.
You now need a bakestone or a heavy iron griddle. Rub it with butter and wipe the excess away. Put it on to a direct heat and wait until it heats up, place the Welsh cakes on the griddle, turning once. They need about 2-3 minutes each side. Each side needs to be caramel brown before turning although some people I know like them almost burnt.
Remove from the pan and dust with caster sugar while still warm. Some people leave out the dried fruit, and split them when cool and sandwich them together with jam.
My kids opted for no jam so they could stay on the couch. They scarfed them up while we talked about what it means to be Welsh. We had a great time.
I ended the day by finding out that my oh so Welsh Dragon Daddy husband has, to his recollection, never eaten a Welsh cake. Now, I think it's time to sit down and discuss with him what it means to be Welsh.
