Winnie the Pooh's Teatime Cookbook

by A.A. Milne, Ernest H. Shepard (Illustrator)

Discusses the phenomenon of afternoon tea and provides recipes for muffins, pastries, and other appropriate fare, punctuated by quotations from the works of A. A. Milne

Genres: Cookbooks, Cooking, Food, Nonfiction, Tea

64 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 1993

About the author

Alan Alexander Milne (pronounced /ˈmɪln/) was an English author, best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh and for various children's poems.

A. A. Milne was born in Kilburn, London, to parents Vince Milne and Sarah Marie Milne (née Heginbotham) and grew up at Henley House School, 6/7 Mortimer Road (now Crescent), Kilburn, a small public school run by his father. One of his teachers was H. G. Wells who taught there in 1889–90. Milne attended Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he studied on a mathematics scholarship. While there, he edited and wrote for Granta, a student magazine. He collaborated with his brother Kenneth and their articles appeared over the initials AKM. Milne's work came to the attention of the leading British humour magazine Punch, where Milne was to become a contributor and later an assistant editor.

Milne joined the British Army in World War I and served as an officer in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment and later, after a debilitating illness, the Royal Corps of Signals. He was discharged on February 14, 1919.

After the war, he wrote a denunciation of war titled Peace with Honour (1934), which he retracted somewhat with 1940's War with Honour. During World War II, Milne was one of the most prominent critics of English writer P. G. Wodehouse, who was captured at his country home in France by the Nazis and imprisoned for a year. Wodehouse made radio broadcasts about his internment, which were broadcast from Berlin. Although the light-hearted broadcasts made fun of the Germans, Milne accused Wodehouse of committing an act of near treason by cooperating with his country's enemy. Wodehouse got some revenge on his former friend by creating fatuous parodies of the Christopher Robin poems in some of his later stories, and claiming that Milne "was probably jealous of all other writers.... But I loved his stuff."

He married Dorothy "Daphne" de Sélincourt in 1913, and their only son, Christopher Robin Milne, was born in 1920. In 1925, A. A. Milne bought a country home, Cotchford Farm, in Hartfield, East Sussex. During World War II, A. A. Milne was Captain of the Home Guard in Hartfield & Forest Row, insisting on being plain 'Mr. Milne' to the members of his platoon. He retired to the farm after a stroke and brain surgery in 1952 left him an invalid and by August 1953 "he seemed very old and disenchanted".

He was 74 years old when he passed away in 1956.

Reviews

[Miranda Reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

"There is a certain time of day when lunch is a distant memory and dinner seems very far off indeed. For a bear like Pooh...teatime is a perfect invention."

NOBODY TELL PIGLET ABOUT THE HAM SANDWICH

*Ahem* Onwards to the review!

This is one of three mini Winnie the Pooh Cookbooks (the other two being the Cookie Book and the Picnic Cookbook, all published in the 1990s. These are physically small books, about the size of my hand, so they definitely tick the cuteness box.

We begin by learning about the creator of tea (Anna, the seventh duchess of Bedford). Additionally, we are taught how to make a good pot of tea and various ways you can serve it (warm milk & honey, banana malt, orange milk (some of these seem questionable to me)).

From there we delve into six types of foods that can accompany your tea party:

Breads and Toasts: We get a variety of loaf breads along with some toasts. Toasts in this book are like open faced sandwiches, warmed and crisped so everything is melty and delicious.

Recipes Include:
--Sandwich Bread (plain, honest bread. Modification included to make whole-wheat bread)
--Soda Bread (a round loaf, risen with baking soda and buttermilk)
--Oatmeal Honey Bread (yeasted bread, flavored with honey and cinnamon)
--Banana Bread
--Chocolate Tea Bread (cocoa, yogurt, and chocolate chips)
--Cheese and Apple Toasts
--Welsh Rabbit (NO rabbits harmed - just cheese and seasoning)
--Sesame Toast (butter and sesame seeds)
--Cinnamon Toast

Scones, Muffins, and Crumpets: Here we have some heartier pastries common to tea time.

Recipes Include:
--Plain Scones (a dense baked good often served with jam and clotted cream)
--Cheese Scones
--Oatmeal Raisin Scones
--Blueberry Muffins
--Apple Bran Muffins
--Crumpets (like "English Muffins")

Jams and Butters: These are some fun delicacies to add to your homemade breads and scones from earlier.

Recipes Include:
--Strawberry Jam
--Orange Marmalade
--Apple Butter (a thicker apple sauce with spices)
--Honey Butter (regular butter but flavored with honey)
--Strawberry Butter (regular butter but mixed with fresh mashed strawberries)

Sandwiches: These are delicious variations on old classics! Most are savory but there is a sweet one.

Recipes Include:
--Chicken Salad
--Curried Chicken Salad
--Egg Salad
--Cucumber Sandwiches
--Ham Sandwiches with Honey Mustard (DON'T TELL PIGLET)
--Tuna Sandwiches
--Cream Cheese Sandwiches
--Banana-Honey Sandwiches

Cookies and Biscuits: These are fun little handheld sweets to enjoy after your scones and savories.

Recipes Include:
--Jam Cookies
--Lemon Bars
--Almond Cookies
--Walnut Diamonds (plain cookies, with a brown sugar walnut filling)
--Shortbread
--Sugar Cookies
--Shrewsbury Biscuits (flavored with lemon, raisins, sprinkled with powdered sugar)
--Chocolate Digestives (whole-wheat cookies with chocolate and brown sugar)

Cakes and Pastries: The final round! We have all sorts of delicious treats to try!

Recipes Include:
--Honey Cake
--Carrot Cake
--Lemon Poppy-Seed Cakes (made in a muffin tin)
--Lemon Pound Cake
--Chocolate Cake
--Eccles Cakes (pastry dough with raisins and currants folded in, topped with granulated sugar)
--Meringues (whipped egg whites, lightly flavored)
--Pecan Tarts

Overall Thoughts:

I think this is a rather well-done tea time cookbook.

I really enjoyed learning about the history of tea time and its significance. I feel like for a proper tea, you need: Scones, Savories, and Sweets. The wide variety of recipes do provide plenty of options for a tea party - just go right down the line and choose a handful of recipes across the categories.

I do wish we had a bit stronger of a connection to the literature. I did like the colorful illustrations of the characters (even if what they were doing often wasn't connected to the recipes) but I wish there was a bit more information about why the recipes were chosen.

Sometimes the connections were obvious - like Honey Cake or Carrot Cake and others had me scratching my head (like Meringues or Walnut Diamonds). They probably work for tea time but do they work for a Winnie-the-Pooh cookbook? What's the connection to the literary theme?

Additionally, I thought that the inclusion of the Ham Sandwich was in poor taste. When you have anthropomorphic animals in your series, you don't include a recipe for how to EAT one of your main characters.

[Sarah Brazytis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Super adorable, and perfect for any lover of Pooh and his friends! I haven't made any of the recipes yet, although I'd love to. They have a distinct British flavor - lots of lemon and watercress. ;)

[Lorie LovesBooks · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very cute little cookbook, I plan on making some of the sandwiches. At the beginning of each section was an excerpt from one of the books by A. A. Milne. The recipes are not very complicated, but there is not a lot of variety I was hoping there would have been some salads inspired by Rabbit.

[Tiffany Grimm · Rating 4 out of 5]

Adorable with tasty recipies

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Adorable!

[Danette · Rating 3 out of 5]

These sound yummy!

[Wileyoneone · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book - no longer have