Marzipan is a traditional Christmas food that many people enjoy today, but did the Tudors have it at Christmas?
Learn more about marzipan, or marchpane, in today’s video…
The REAL TRUTH about Anne Boleyn - The Most Happy
Marzipan is a traditional Christmas food that many people enjoy today, but did the Tudors have it at Christmas?
Learn more about marzipan, or marchpane, in today’s video…
My mum sister and myself all love marzipan, my mum sadly is no longer with us but we always had a box of the marzipan fruits at Christmas, I still buy a box for myself and for my sister, it’s origins are very old dating back to the Roman times where it was called ‘marchpane’, in Tudor times it was indeed on many a wealthy households table and we can appreciate the hard work that went into creating it, the almonds took hours to pound before it was prepared with sugar, another costly ingredient and then made into puddings and other sweet confections, it was the mistress of the household who surprisingly used to take on this arduous task of the pounding, possibly because it was very expensive, in Henry V111’s kitchens of course he had an army of staff to prepare the delicious sweet meats for his desserts, and before eating, the confection would have been gilded and iced, surprisingly he did have in his employ a female confectioner, next to the wonderful sculptured designs made from sugar and meringues the kings table must have been a truly wonderful sight to see, it seems it is still popular today in many a country, in Germany it is traditional to eat a marzipan pig on Christmas Day and one year I bought three from Culpeper’s herbal shop in Convent Garden, one for mum and Sis and the other of course for me, no one else liked it, Culpeper’s was a lovely quaint little shop and later it closed down, but you could buy horsehair brushes and wooden combs and lovely candles scented sachets, toiletries the wonderful array of herbs along with old fashioned ginger beer and lemonade in glass bottles, it was great for little gifts now I don’t think there’s any in the uk, in Harrods they sell huge marzipan fruits about £5 needless to say I never bought any! It’s a taste I think a bit like marmite, you either love it or hate it, I recall years ago I was covering it on the Christmas cake and crumbs had fallen off from the packet, our Jack Russell lapped it up he absolutely loved it, so bless him I used to give him some now and then at Christmas time, another fan of the ancient sweet which is probably the oldest or amongst the oldest of all.