I recently re-read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll and I'm so taken with it. I'd forgotten how bizarre and droll and darkly hilarious Alice's adventures actually are! Not to mention delicious...as soon as she's down the rabbit-hole, our pedantic, treat-loving little heroine is already sipping magic cordials and nibbling petit-fours like there's no tomorrow:
Alice ventured to taste [the drink], and, finding it very nice (it had, in fact, a sort of mixed flavour of cherry-tart, custard, pine-apple, roast turkey, toffy, and hot buttered toast), she very soon finished it off...
Soon her eye fell on a little glass box that was lying under the table: she opened it, and found in it a very small cake, on which the words "EAT ME" were beautifully marked in currants. "Well, I'll eat it," said Alice, "and if it makes me grow larger, I can reach the key; and if it makes me grow smaller, I can creep under the door: so either way I'll get into the garden, and I don't care which happens!"
She ate a little bit, and said anxiously to herself "Which way? Which way?", holding her hand on the top of her head to feel which way it was growing; and she was quite surprised to find that she remained the same size. To be sure, this is what generally happens when one eats cake; but Alice had got so much into the way of expecting nothing but out-of-the-way things to happen, that it seemed quite dull and stupid for life to go on in the common way.
So she set to work, and very soon finished off the cake.
In fact, Adventures in Wonderland engages itself entirely with indulgence; at the very least, the adventure of eating and drinking. In Wonderland, a potion or poundcake has the power to change you (and it tastes good too). That's my kind of story!
Needless to say, I'm both jealous of Alice and inspired by her escapades. So I set to work making a whimsical treat fit for a mad tea party. I'm sure Lewis Carroll wouldn't object to me making it gluten-free...
Ta-da!
(Gluten-Free!) Currant Cream Cake
with European Buttercream
Better than a fairy tale...
Illustrations: Arthur Rackham (top), Gwynned M. Hudson (middle).
