Hagrid's Infamous Rock Cakes

As a final push to get you in the mood for this Friday's opening of Harry Potter, here's another magical treat from the HP cookbook.

The first time Harry and Ron sampled Hagrid's Rock Cakes, they were described as "shapeless lumps with raisins that almost broke their teeth" (Harry Potter and the Socerer's Stone, p. 140).  Unlike their literary namesakes, these rock cakes are actually quite soft...though they still do look like lumps with raisins.

I like them because they're not too sweet and would indeed go rather nicely with a nice cuppa in the afternoon or as a companion for coffee in the morning.  Try them, I promise a trip to the dentist will NOT be in your future.

Rock Cakes
(instructions have been paraphrased for TCC reader clarification)

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) cold butter, cut into cubes
1 large egg
1/3 cup milk
1 cup raisins

In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.  Using your fingers, rub the butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture has the consistency of wet sand.

butter cubes

wet sand

In a small bowl, beat the egg and milk together and then pour into the wet sand mixture.  Fold it together.  The dough will be slightly moist and not very stiff.

Fold the raisins into the dough and then drop the dough by rounded tablespoons on a cookies sheet (about 2" apart) on a lightly greased cookie sheet.

Bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes* (mine were done at 13 minutes) until they are lightly browned on the bottom.

Remove cookie sheet from oven and transfer rock cakes to a rack to cool.

NOTES

* The original recipe had a bit of a discrepancy.  It instructs to drop the dough by rounded tablespoonfuls on the cookie sheet and then bake for 25 minutes until bottoms done, but the tablespoon-sized lumps I made only took 13 minutes to cook.  I was able to make 24 rock cakes while they state that their recipe makes only 12.

FYI, three (3) small snack boxes of raisins = 1 cup (or at least close enough to 1 cup to work with the recipe).  I find that it's less expensive to buy a six-pack of snack boxes than one large box.  Just something to consider if you don't eat raisins on a regular basis and want to avoid waste.

I'd like to send a special thanks to my kitchen minion, Cousin Jen, who helped in getting this recipe done and removing the temptation to eat all the rock cakes myself by taking half of them home with her.  It's nice to have family around to help out in a crisis.