Sweet and aromatic honey cake was known and eaten in ancient times, including Egypt, Rome and Greece. It was called honey cake because of its honey content, giving this baked product its unique taste and durability. It was also made using browned rye flour, with the addition of vodka and pungent spices: ground pepper, ginger, cinnamon, cardamom and cloves.
In Europe, gingerbread production began by monks at the Tagernsee monastery in the 11th century. By 1293, they were being made by skilled bakers from Ulm and Swidnica. They were sold in specific places: stalls, gingerbread shops, pharmacies, fairs and indulgences in many European cities, including Nuremberg, Aachen, Torun, Krakow, Wroclaw and Gdansk.
In old Poland, honey cakes were ceremonial baked goods. The preservative properties of honey meant that the cake could be kept cold for several months or even years. According to custom, young married women received a lump of such dough as a wedding gift from their mothers, as part of their dowry.
In old Poland, dry gingerbread was served as a snack with vodka and wine. Sweet gingerbreads with more honey were served for dessert. Actually, until the 19th century, these pastries were treated as a luxury product, available to the wealthy bourgeoisie, nobility and aristocracy. In the countryside, gingerbread appeared only after honey was replaced by a cheaper raw material, beet syrup.
Gingerbread was also eaten for medicinal purposes. They were believed to have a beneficial effect on digestion, hence their presence in aristocratic medicine cabinets. The oldest printed recipe for Toronto gingerbread most likely comes from the pharmaceutical and medical handbook Compendium medicum auctum published in Czestochowa in 1725.
Artisanal gingerbread production in Poland began as early as the 15th century. The greatest fame was won by the products of the Toruń masters. They equaled their quality to the famous Nuremberg gingerbread, considered the best in Europe. In 1566, Torun and Nuremberg concluded an agreement under which Torun guilds could bake Nuremberg gingerbread, and Nuremberg could bake Torun gingerbread.
Gingerbread was baked throughout the year, but took on special significance during Christmas. The dough was prepared already at the beginning of Advent, so that it could mature properly. Gingerbread was considered a Lenten dish, and for this reason it was included in the Christmas Eve menu, both in the form of dough and as an addition to the traction gravy.
Beautiful, richly decorated and very expensive gingerbread was made in the city's artisan workshops, depicting ladies and bachelors in exquisite hats, carriages, images of saints, genre scenes, farm and domestic animals. To press, punch and decorate them, clay molds or handmade wooden molds with concave relief were used. They were prepared not only by outstandingly skilled bakers, but also by professional woodcarvers and wood engravers. They were distinguished by their high artistic qualities. Today they are rare and valuable museum exhibits.
A popular tradition associated with the holiday season was the preparation of a gingerbread house. This custom was undoubtedly inspired by the fairy tale of Hansel and Gretel. Gingerbread also played an interesting role in social communication. It was part of a love game, a dialogue between lovers (including gingerbread in the shape of hearts, doves, gloves). It was also present at nuptials, where it was part of the wedding menu or dowry. In everyday life, it was part of events such as engagements, weddings (coach), the birth of a child (stork, cradle), the start of school (alphabet), and the cycle of the liturgical calendar (Easter lambs, roosters, Christmas nativity scenes). He was a prize in competitions. The presentation of figural gingerbread may have been an expression of gratitude, kindness, a hidden message or a humorous joke.
Gingerbread products could be bought at indulgences, they could be souvenirs from pilgrimages to shrines, and were sometimes hung in homes next to holy images. They were usually gingerbread depicting saints or religious motifs.
During the Baroque period, gingerbread coats of arms, together with depictions of customs, mythological and religious scenes, as well as various types of three-dimensional spatial constructions, were the original decoration of the feasting table. Later, the decorative role of gingerbread survived in the custom developed in the 18th and 19th centuries of decorating Christmas trees with them.
The customs associated with this baking have survived to this day and are an important part of Europe's culinary heritage. A beautiful tradition is family baking of Christmas gingerbread and then decorating them together. They are also not to be missed at Christmas markets. In many homes, gingerbread is eaten not only as a dessert dish, but is also used as a condiment, an ingredient in sauces, and a side dish. Any visit to Torun must necessarily end with the purchase of the famous Torun gingerbread. They make excellent souvenirs and gifts for loved ones.
Recently, more and more museums and expositions dedicated to gingerbread have been established, as well as gingerbread shops and manufactories. Regional gingerbreads are included on the List of Traditional Products of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. This increase in interest in these baked goods testifies to their important role in our country's culture.
Here are some gingerbread recipes from old cookbooks
Lutsk gingerbread
Pour a glass of pure spirit into 1 liter of honey, stir, fry slowly skimming. Add after skimming a little fried orange peel, finely chopped, some sifted cinnamon, aniseed, a few cloves, and five grains of white pepper; one and a half liters of rye flour scalded beforehand in a saucepan over the fire, knead with this hot honey adding an incomplete spoonful of potash powder. After 1/2 - 1 hour of pounding out the dough with a spoon, knead round or oblong gingerbread cookies on wafers, place on a baking sheet greased with wax and bake in a fairly hot oven.
Maria Ochorowicz-Monatowa. The universal cookbook
Gingerbreads called pestles
Make thin cakes of rye flour on water with honey sweetened and bake until they brown; When they are dry, mash and sift through a thick sieve, fry the honey and deglaze and sift through a thick sieve, fry and deglaze the honey, pour into it enough mashed flour to make a thick mass, when it fries for some time, add orange peels, cooked well in advance and finely chopped, white ginger, almonds or chopped nuts, and having fried well, put them on the wafers and cover with them pressing a little to hold them in place and put in a very slow oven so that they do not burn.
Maria Marciszewska. Cook of the nobility
Interleaved gingerbread
Boil a quart of honey in a saucepan, skim it and pour in 2 quarts of potato flour, or half with wheat flour, pour in a couple of tablespoons of orange water, add spices and 2 tablespoons of potash, beat with a spatula to a not too thick dough, then stretch it to the thickness of a small finger with hands soaked in almond oil, on baking trays lubricated with the same oil and cover it with an almond paste with sugar, or dried preserves; cover it with the second slice of the dough, spread with beer mixed with honey, garnish with hemlock and almonds separated into halves and bake in a summer oven. When they come away from the tin, take them out and cut them into smaller pieces.
Jadwiga Izdebska. Polish cuisine and pantry
Toronto gingerbread
Pour a quart of pure patoki honey in a saucepan and cook until browned. Then set it aside, and when it has cooled down, pour in 4 quarts of wheat flour, mix it and, lining it up on a pastry board, knead it into a firm dough, adding various spices: cinnamon, cloves, allspice, half a teaspoon of grated ginger, cardemon, orange peel, or hemlock finely cut, pour in 4 scoops of potash and knead it with all this for an hour. Stretch this mass on 2 fingers thickly on bachy greased with oil, spread it with beer, decorate it with almonds, split in half, thinly sliced hemlock and bake it in an oven heated as for bread. When the gingerbread comes away from the baking tray, it is a sign that it is baked. Use these gingerbreads only a few weeks after baking, when they have softened.
Jadwiga Izdebska. Polish cuisine and pantry
Elaborated. Joanna Radziewicz
Photo. pixabay.com - public domain
Literature:
1. Jędrzejewska, Anna Kornelia "Gingerbread and its role in culture" in Home, everyday and holiday: domestic space - people and things: historical and anthropological studies / edited by Bożena Popiołek, Agnieszka Chłosta-Sikorska, Marcin Gadocha. Krakow, 2018, pp. 186-196
2. Ogrodowska, Barbara: Traditions of the Polish table. Warsaw, 2010.
3. Gourmet, Alexander K.: Camp medicine and sweetness worthy of a king, or a short history of gingerbread. Pharmacopola, 2021 no. 6.
