Coffee Patty Cake

I don't like coffee. Apart from an occasional Greek or Turkish coffee, usually drunk late at night, I just don't like it. I don't mind coffee in other things though, coffee ice cream, coffee lolly drops, or Coffee Patty Cake such as we are looking at here. Weird I know, but I am well known for my high levels of fussiness. Have we discussed my abhorrence of pumpkin? Don't fret, we will — there is a cake yet to be cooked which is made from the revolting stuff. I may need to undergo hypnosis in order to eat it. 

Just what is a patty cake you ask? I looked high and low for an answer. Well, if 'high and low' means I Googled, then yes, that's just what I did. A Wikipedia article led me to this;

Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, baker's man.

Bake me a cake as fast as you can;

Roll it, Pat it and mark it with B,

Put it in the oven for baby and me.

According to Wikipedia — and of course Wikipedia is without error, ever — this is a modern example of one of the oldest surviving English nursery rhymes. The rhyme though was first recorded in the play, The Campaigners by Thomas d'Urfey in 1698, where a 'nurse says to her charges:...and pat a cake Bakers man, so I will master as I can, and prick it, and prick it, and prick it, and prick it, and prick it, and throw't into the Oven'. 

The consistency of this cake is much like a wet bread mix, and means the mixture has to be shaped into the tin. If I felt like getting my hands dirty, I could have patted it. It's an easy leap from 'patting the cake' to naming it a patty cake. Maybe. I like words, so it's always interesting to have a teeny mystery solved about where a phrase or word comes from, and if there's food involved? Even better.

If you want to make your own coffee essence for this, please head over to Coffee Biscuits where there is a recipe.  

Coffee Patty Cake

115g butter

¾ cup sugar

2 eggs

1 cup self-raising flour

½ cup plain flour

Pinch salt

1 tbsp. coffee essence

3 tbsp. boiling water

Preheat oven to 160°C

Cream butter, add eggs one at a time, beating well.

Fold in sifted flour and salt, then add other ingredients.

Turn into a greased cake pan and bake in moderate oven for around 30 minutes.

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For those of you who are not in Australia, please find here a selection of Measurement & Temperature Conversion Charts which should help with the accuracy of your own cooking.