Brandy snaps are a popular snack or dessert food in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand, similar to the Italian

cannoli Cannoli (; scn, cannola ) are Italian pastries consisting of tube-shaped shells of fried pastry dough, filled with a sweet, creamy filling containing ricotta—a staple of Sicilian cuisine. They range in size from . In mainland Italy, they are ...

. They are often tubular, brittle, sweet, baked casings that are typically long and in diameter. Brandy snaps are customarily served filled with whipped cream. They are commonly made from a mixture of golden syrup,

flour Flour is a powder made by grinding raw grains, roots, beans, nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many culture ...

ginger Ginger (''Zingiber officinale'') is a flowering plant whose rhizome, ginger root or ginger, is widely used as a spice A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring or coloring food. Spices ...

cream Cream is a dairy product composed of the higher-fat layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. In un-homogenized milk, the fat, which is less dense, eventually rises to the top. In the industrial production of cream, this process ...

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double ...

butter Butter is a dairy product made from the fat and protein components of churned cream. It is a semi-solid emulsion at room temperature, consisting of approximately 80% butterfat. It is used at room temperature as a spread, melted as a condiment ...

and lemon juice. A variation on the recipe included

bicarbonate of soda Sodium bicarbonate (IUPAC name: sodium hydrogencarbonate), commonly known as baking soda or bicarbonate of soda, is a chemical compound with the formula NaHCO3. It is a salt composed of a sodium cation ( Na+) and a bicarbonate anion ( HCO3−) ...

egg An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the a ...

and

self-raising flour Flour is a powder made by grinding raw grains, roots, beans, nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many cultures. ...

instead. The snaps are cooked on a moderate heat and are baked briefly as a flat disc that is then rolled while still hot and soft. The whipped cream can be sweetened with brandy or vanilla. However, the name ''brandy snap'' has no reference to

brandy Brandy is a liquor produced by distilling wine. Brandy generally contains 35–60% alcohol by volume (70–120 US proof) and is typically consumed as an after-dinner digestif. Some brandies are aged in wooden casks. Others are coloured with ...

, the spirit. The name "brandy" is related to "branded" (as in burnt).

History

An early Victorian etymology for brandy snaps is "''brand''-schnap, from being burnt, not for the real or supposed presence of brandy". The brandy snap is a popular sweet snack sold at the annual

Hull Fair Hull Fair is Europe's largest travelling funfair, which comes to Kingston upon Hull, England for one week from 5 pm on Friday to 11 pm of the Saturday eight days later, encompassing 11 October each year. The fair is open every day betwe ...

, held every October. The product sold at the fair has traditionally been made by Wright and Co. at its Bridge End Works in

Brighouse Brighouse is a town within the metropolitan borough of Calderdale, in West Yorkshire, England. Historically within the West Riding of Yorkshire, it is situated on the River Calder, east of Halifax. It is served by Junction 25 of the M62 m ...

West Yorkshire West Yorkshire is a metropolitan and ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. It is an inland and upland county having eastward-draining valleys while taking in the moors of the Pennines. West Yorkshire came into exi ...

References

British desserts Irish cuisine Australian desserts New Zealand desserts Biscuits {{dessert-stub