Yorkshire Parkin

I was looking through a book I have of 'homemade' everything; from bath 'pretties' to foods to dried flowers. They had a photo of 5 different breads and named them all... and proceeded to give recipes for everything except the one I was most interested in! Yorshire Parkin. A bread that looked so dark it was almost black and had tiny dots of 'something' in it. I was a bit miffed it didn't give the recipe, but I suspect it is an oversight as it does give for all the other breads. Anyway, it piqued my interest so I had to come to the computer to look it up.

I will share with you what I found: A moist ginger cake usually served cut in squares. It originated in Yorkshire, where oatmeal is always used in its preparation.


Ingredients

4ozs lard or margarine
4ozs golden syrup
4ozs black treacle
4ozs sugar
8ozs plain flour
8ozs medium oatmeal
pinch of salt
4 teasp. ground ginger
2 teasp. ground cinnamon
1 teasp. bicarb. of soda
1 egg

Method

Heat the oven to 150C or gas mark 1.

Melt the fat. Add the syrup, treacle and sugar and warm over a very low heat till the sugar begins to dissolve. Avoid overheating the mixture, keeping the saucepan warm rather than hot.

Sieve the dry ingredients, make a well in the centre and gradualy beat in the liquid from the saucepan & the beaten egg. Mix to a soft consistency, adding a little milk if required.

Pour into a greased flat tin so that the mixture is 1 inch in depth. Bake for 1 hour in a cool oven (300 degrees,or mark 1) and partly cool it in the tin, then turn out to finish cooling.

Serve the parkin cut into squares.