Whist looking in the archives for Christmas Pudding recipes last year we came across this recipe for Bible Cake. The recipe was loose in an envelope marked ‘How to make a Bible Cake’, in the Sadborow Cookery Book, a late seventeenth, early eighteenth-century cookery book.
Bible Cake, also known as Scripture Cake or Old Testament Cake, is a kind of puzzle in that the baker is required to know the Bible (or have one to look up references) to discover what ingredients are needed.
Made and eaten mainly at Christmas, Easter and Weddings it was a very popular cake in the nineteenth century and was often used to teach young girls in Sunday School both baking and Bible verses.
Although no method is included with the recipe it follows the general rules of cake baking:
• Grease a cake tin lightly with butter and line it with some baking parchment.
• Chop up Nahum iii, 12 fine.
• In a mixing bowl cream together Judges V, 25, Jeremiah VI, 20, and I Samuel XIV, 25. Slowly add Jeremiah VI, 20 one at a time and beat to mix.
• Add to this bowl I Samuel XXX, 12, Nahum III, 12 and half of Numbers XVII, 8 and beat until everything is mixed.
• In a large mixing bowl sift together 1 Kings IV, 22, Amos IV, 5 and Chronicles IX, 9, Leviticus II, 13 and make a well in centre
• Pour the first mixing bowl ingredients into the well in the centre of the second mixing bowl, (wet ingredients into the dry ingredients) and stir until a cake batter starts to form.
• Lastly slowly add enough of Judges IV, 19 into the cake batter so it becomes easier to mix, and the mixture will easily drop off the mixing spoon. Pour it into the prepared cake tin.
• Sprinkle over the top the remaining half of Numbers XVII, 9 and gently press them part way into the batter.
• Bake the Cake at 160C/Gas Mark 3 for 1-1/2 hours or until done
You can adapt it however you like otherwise, adding or removing ingredients according to taste.
And for those of you who do not want to spend time looking up the ingredients in the Bible a ‘cheats’ sheet was included with the recipe in the envelope:
And, importantly proof that the recipe works…
Overall it came out quite well and was certainly quite tasty! We’d love to see your efforts if you’d like to follow the recipe above, or hear from you if you have any similar recipes for Bible Cake!