My Aunt Jane

DESCRIPTION: "My Aunt Jane she took me in" and gave me tea from her shop. "She's awful smart" and bakes rings in an apple tart. She "has a bell on the door A white stone step and a clean swept floor, Candy apples, hard green pears, Conversation lozenges"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1978 (Hammond-SongsOfBelfast)
KEYWORDS: food nonballad
FOUND IN: Ireland
REFERENCES (3 citations):
Hammond-SongsOfBelfast, p. 12, "My Aunt Jane" (1 text, 1 tune)
Kane-SongsAndSayingsOfAnUlsterChildhood, p. 39, "My Aunt Jane she called me in" (1 fragment)
Peirce-KeepTheKettleBoiling, p. 63, "(My Aunt Jane she called me in)" (1 text)
Roud #5642
NOTES [65 words]: Hammond-SongsOfBelfast: "Probably the best-loved of all Belfast songs." - BS
The practice of baking prizes (such as coins or rings) into cakes is well-attested, even if it is today remembered mostly because J. R. R. Tolkien mentioned it in Smith of Wootton Major, but it seems somewhat improbable to find it in the context of a Belfast tea-shop; how did Aunt Jane afford such thing? - RBW
Last updated in version 6.6
File: Hamm012

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