Florence White

God’s Kitchel

Suffolk

Appears in
top 1000Good Things in England
Good Things in England

By Florence White

Published 1932

  • About

‘God’s Kichel, a cake given to godchildren at their asking a blessing.’ This is the meaning given in Dunton’s Ladies’ Dictionary 1694.

In 1892 Lady Gomme (First President of the English Folk Cookery Association) collected and arranged an Exhibition of Local Feasten Cakes, in connection with the International Folk Lore Congress held in London in that year; and amongst a number of other cakes exhibited some God’s Kitchels from Suffolk.

Cowell, in his Law Dictionary on the word ‘Kichell,’ says: ‘It was a good old custom for godfathers and godmothers, every time their godchildren asked them a blessing, to give them a cake, which was a God’s-Kichell. It is a still proverbial saying in some countries: “ask me a blessing, and I will give you some plum-cake”.’