" 'What on earth did I ask him to tea for!' [Bilbo] said to himself, as he went to the pantry. He had only just had breakfast, but he thought a cake or two and a drink of something would do... He rushed and put on the kettle, and put out another cup and saucer and an extra cake or two, and ran to the door. "I am so sorry to keep you waiting!" he was going to say, when he saw that it was not Gandalf at all. It was a dwarf... [Bilbo] liked visitors, but he liked to know them before they arrived, and he preferred to ask them himself. He had a horrible thought that the cakes might run short, and then he (as the host: he knew his duty and stuck to it however painful) he might have to go without."
- J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit
As I mentioned
in my previous post, I recently went to Portland, and while I was there a friend and I went to a tea festival. It was lovely, but one side-effect of that festival was that I returned home with an
intense craving for starting my morning with tea and some sort of scone or tea cake.
However, I am trying to be healthy, and (as one demonstration at the tea festival reminded me) such treats are usually full of sugar, flour, and butter. Plus, I had just been gone for several days and my options for ingredients was... let's say "limited."
 |
Oh good, an old banana I forgot to eat before I left... that'll help. |
However, after some brainstorming and checking my pantries, I realized that I had just the right ingredients to make, well, something tasty.