NOT jam puffs...

but still scrumptiously good.

Just not very puffy.

I've been reading waaaay to much British literature lately. For no apparent reason except I feel like it, and Ed renting Wuthering Heights last week, and myself aquiring about 100 books, many of which were printed in London, and most of which are British classics, and having a new public library to explore. (How's that for a run-on sentence, Mrs. Stegman?)

All part of the 'pudding' rabbit trail, no doubt.

The children are engrossed in other pursuits, and have no interest in listening to Dickens and Shakespeare. The Wolves of Willoughby Chase (The Wolves Chronicles), their current bedtime read-aloud, is an adventure of some thoroughly British girls, governess and absentee parents and all, but that's as far as it goes.

They are, however, enjoying the effects of my reading- puddings and comfort food. All good literature has good food in it, and I get overcome with cravings when I read of elegant ladies having jam puffs with their tea.

Well, after finding some recipes for jam puffs, I can say I am appalled.

I remain quite confused how the British can eat the way they do in books and yet have managed to dominate the globe the way they did for so long...

No way at all can you give a jam puff a nutritional face-lift! So we settled for jam-stuffed biscuits, which are delicious and won't contribute to diabetes or cancer or what have you.

Quite a treat with some lemon balm or chamomile tea on a stormy afternoon- which is how the afternoons have been going here.

Jam-filled Biscuits
2c wh wh flour
1/2t real salt
2t aluminun-free baking powder
1c pecans or walnuts or 1.2 slivered almonds
Mix in large bowl.
Add:
1/2c oil (I used raw, organic coconut)
2/3c water or milk
Mix onlt till moistened, knead several times.
Roll out 1/2" thick, cut and place on greased baking sheets. Indent the centers with your thumb; fill with jam. We used raspberry fruit spread. Roll remaining dough as thin as possible with the chucks of nut poking about, and place on top of jam. If you want, you can use your fingers to seal them around the edges. Holds in the jam, but they don't puff up as much as they would otherwise.

Bake at 400 for 15-17 minutes.
Fighting waiting for the biscuits....

Brush with extra jam while warm if you wish.

I am making a double batch of these tomorrow!

"Spend the afternoon. You can't take it with you."
-Annie Dillard

"The best kind of rain, of course, is a cozy rain. This is the kind the anonymous medieval poet makes me remember, the rain that falls on a day when you'd just as soon stay in bed a little longer, write letters or read a good book by the fire, take early tea with hot scones and jam and look out the streaked window with complacency."
-Susan Allen Toth, England For All Seasons

"Nobody does childhood like the English!"
-Mike Meyers