Dave in Council Bluffs, Iowa, has fond memories of Hough Bakeries in Cleveland, Ohio, which made a treat called lady locks. Sometimes called lady locks, foam rollers, and clothespin cookies, they featured puff pastry rolled around a small cylinder — much like women used to roll their hair on hot curlers — and baked and filled with a tasty cream. In Austria, a similar version goes by the name Schaumrollen, which translates as foam rolls, and Schillerlocken, a reference to the impressive locks of the German poet Friedrich Schiller. Amanda Plakosh wrote to say that lady locks are a staple of every cookie table in Pittsburgh and she sent us her grandmother’s recipe. She gave us permission to share it with you! Download it here. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Lady Locks Pastry”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hello, this is Dave. I’m calling from Council Bluffs, Iowa.
Council Bluffs, Iowa. Welcome to the show.
Well, thank you. I’m glad to be here.
What can we do for you?
When I was a young man, say pre-10, my aunt and uncle used to take me to a bakery in Cleveland, Ohio, called Huff’s Bakery.
And, by the way, that’s where my whole family came from.
And one of the most favorite things that I would get at that bakery is something called a lady lock.
And I devoured those very readily and always asked for more.
Now I’m 71 years old.
I’m out here in Iowa, and when we first moved this direction,
I went down to the bakery, and I asked the baker if they had ladylocks,
And they said they’d never heard of such a thing.
And as I looked in their case, I saw something that somewhat resembled a ladylock,
Except it was about half the size.
And I said, well, that’s a ladylock there.
They said, no, no, it’s a cream horn.
Cream horn.
Now, as far as I’m concerned, the Ladylock folks at Huff Bakeries had the edge on this,
And they’re Ladylocks, they’re not cream horns.
So I’d like to have that battle solved.
Let’s just get some clarification here.
So Ladylock, we’re two words, L-A-D-Y, L-O-C-K, right?
Yes, sir.
And describe what it looks like.
How did you recognize it in the baker’s cabinet?
It’s shaped kind of like a horn, where they probably got the cream horn.
It’s a puff pastry done in a swirl, and there would be a cream filling inside.
It would be sprinkled with a rough sugar crystals on the outside of it.
Okay, that sounds wonderful.
I’ll be back in a minute.
I’m going to get some of those.
Yeah, so you’re wondering why they’re called Ladylocks?
Well, no, I believe they are called ladylocks because they look like a ladylock.
You mean like a lock of what? A lock of ladies’ hair?
Like a lock of ladies’ hair. That’s right. Kind of swirly or spoolie.
So your question is, what’s wrong with Iowa?
Yeah.
Well, I have to tell you, when I was growing up, I knew these as cream horns, for sure. Did you, Grant?
I didn’t know these at all. I didn’t know them really at all.
Oh, you didn’t? Okay.
But I understand there’s a lot of other terms for this. There’s other terms?
Yeah, there are lots of other terms, and they all refer to how these things are made.
Some people call them clothespin cookies.
Some people call them foam rollers.
Wait, clothespin cookies is something else.
But okay, we’ll get back to that in a minute.
For the foam rollers?
Well, lots of different names for these kinds of things.
But yeah, they’re called ladylocks because of how they’re made.
Because you roll out the dough, and then you cut it into strips, and then you roll the strips around something,
Whether it’s a clothespin covered with aluminum foil or some kind of specially made roller,
You roll them around and they’re called lady locks, like locks of hair.
So you cook them rolled around and they puff up and form like this cornucopia-looking thing, right?
And then you jam the filling into the opening after you remove the roller or whatever is inside.
And another version of this is an Austrian specialty called Schielelocken,
Which refers to the 19th century poet Schiller, Friedrich Schiller,
Who had locks of hair like that.
There’s a famous portrait of him,
And it looks like he’s got lady locks on the side of his head,
If you can picture that.
And so they call it in honor of the poet who had this wild-looking hair.
Is anything ringing a bell for you?
No, the only one that rings a bell with me is lady locks.
Okay.
And I kind of feel like our Huff Bakery in Cleveland has the exclusive right to the word.
It seems to me their bakery started in the very early 1900s.
Well, the term is older than that, just so you know.
It goes at least back to the 1880s.
Well, maybe they got me on that one.
So what was inside of yours?
So cream can go in there, whipped cream, or what are we talking about, custard or jelly filling?
What was in yours?
Well, it wasn’t a frosting, and it wasn’t necessarily a whipped cream.
It was a consistency somewhere in between.
Okay, gotcha.
And, of course, that’s what, as kids, that’s what we wanted more than anything, was the cream that was inside.
Well, Dave, thank you so much for sharing these sweet memories.
I’m sure you’ve brought back a lot of good ones for people who enjoy Lady Locks.
I miss them dearly.
Very good.
Take care.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
Thank you.
Bye-bye.
Email words@waywordradio.org
Or talk to us on Twitter @wayword.
