Faggots, herring, and small beer: food for sale

Introduction

Market stall produce from a Carmarthen farmhouse, by Mrs E. Evans, Pencader.

In the industrial towns and villages of both north and south Wales, selling traditional dishes from the home or on the local market stall used to be a prominent cottage industry. During sickness, industrial strife or if the bread-winner of the family died, the income gained from selling home-made food or drink made a considerable difference to families who could not rely on the social benefits we enjoy today. The service was also of value to the local community.

Faggots

In the coal-mining villages of south Wales, one of the favourite dishes prepared for selling was faggots. An observer, visiting Merthyr Tydfil market in 1881, witnessed the selling of home-made faggots there:

A pile of what I took to be sausages were steaming furiously over a brazier of burning coals on one end of the bench, with a teapot leaning lazily against it and thinking aloud. Choosing what seemed the least formidable specimen of the food before me, I pointed to the brazier, but in a tone so low I was not heard 'I will take a sausage'. Obeying my gesture, the woman served, the woman served me a saucer-full of the black balls, swimming in hot gravy, and gave me a pewter spoon with which to eat it, instead of the knife and fork which might have been expected with meat. The balls proved to be not unpalatable eating, and were, according to my best judgement, made of liver.

These forcemeat balls were prepared from pig's liver, lights (i.e. lungs), small pieces of pork fat and the thin membrane known as caul. The liver, lights and pork pieces were chopped finely, to which were added chopped onions, breadcrumbs, a little sage and seasoning. All were well mixed together. The caul was then cut into six-inch squares, each piece being wrapped around a tablespoonful of the mixture to form a faggot. Placed side by side in large roasting tins, they were cooked in a moderately hot oven.

They would be served cold with bread and butter for lunch or a supper snack, but it was also a tradition to serve them hot with peas and gravy. Miners' wives or widows striving to augment the family income would buy pig's liver and lights regularly from the local butcher for a nominal sum of money. They would prepare this delicacy with peas to sell from their own homes.

Up until the 1950s, some women in the mining villages of south-east Wales would prepare and cook faggots on specific days of the week throughout the year. Regular customers from the neighbourhood would bring along an earthen jug or bowl to carry home the required number of faggots in gravy and another bowl for peas. One woman recalled how selling a hundred faggots at two pence each every Friday evening provided her with a sum of money to buy a joint of fresh meat for her own family's Sunday lunch. Home-made faggots are still sold today by some well-established stall holders in the market towns of south Wales today.

Pickled Herrings

In north Wales, women would prepare pickled herrings to be sold. Herring fishing was a major industry common to all coastal villages and towns in Wales, but the selling of this traditional dish was confined to the coastal towns and slate-quarrying villages of the northern counties. Placed in an earthenware dish with onion rings, pickling spices and vinegar, water and seasoning, the herrings were baked very slowly until the bones disintegrated. This dish was prepared on specific. Men-servants were known to congregate in a particular vendor's house and while away their time in a convivial atmosphere on a Saturday evening consuming this delicacy. Others would buy them at mid-day and eat them in their own homes with jacket potatoes and oatcakes.

Oatcakes, buns, and bread pudding

Mrs Cathrin Evans stacking the oatcakes together to harden.

Other favourite items prepared in ordinary homes in the counties of south Wales for marketing were yeasted currant buns (pice cwrens) and bread pudding (pwdin bara), while in north Wales oatcakes and muffins were the stock items sold. The art of oatcake-making was prolonged in slate-quarrying districts by women who practised it in order to augment their income. Women proficient in the same craft in agricultural areas were employed as casual labour on larger farms to bake a substantial supply of oatcakes for the harvest period or for the winter months.

Toffee and small beer

Adding icing sugar to prevent toffee sticking together

In the industrial towns of both north and south Wales, home-made toffee and small beer were luxury items sold by ordinary housewives. Home-made toffee, known as cyflaith or india roc in the north, or as taffi dant, or losin dant in the south, would be sold from home or on local market stalls. One particular family in the coal-mining district, at the turn of the century, developed their toffee-making business to the extent that they eventually established a sweet-manufacturing business. Their shop, meeting the demands of the mining community, became a centre where people met to exchange views on cultural and religious topics.

Diod fain or diod ddail (small beer) was a favourite drink with the coal-miner and slate quarry-worker alike: as a thirst quencher it was drunk daily by members of both communities. Local demand proved profitable to many widows or others anxious to find a source of income. They would brew it weekly in large quantities to sell to regular customers for two pence per quart bottle. One woman from Glamorgan, recorded by Amgueddfa Cymru, related how she collected large quantities of nettle-leaf tips and dandelion leaves, in season. They were washed, dried and stored in clean sacks to provide her with a continuous supply throughout the whole year. A quantity of these leaves, together with ground ivy, red-currant leaves and root ginger were boiled, the liquid was strained and sweetened with sugar. Yeast was added to the cooled mixture, which was cooled and allowed to stand overnight. On the following day it was poured and corked securely. In the early decades of the 20th century, the woman recalled selling an average of forty-two bottles per week making a profit of seven shillings, a sum which at that date was an invaluable addition to the low family income. She was one of many other industrious women who supplied their neighbourhood with this delectable drink.