How you eat yours - retro cakes - Food Blog

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How you eat yours - retro cakes

Posted at 12:02PM, 26 July 2011 by Rejina Sabur-Cross - Food writer

Cake pops, whoopie cakes, churros and of course cup cakes - it can sometimes feel like we're barely able to move for the saccharine tsunami of deliciousness that's flooded these shores from foreign climes. However, among these exotic treatlets, and quite possibly because of them, a bigger renaissance seems to be happening in our collective guts and minds. We're talking Fat Rascals, Black Buns and Gypsy Tart; that's right, we're talking about the return of the retro cake.

It could be down to the recession and the consequent yearning for rose-tinted comforts...

It could be down to the recession and the consequent yearning for rose-tinted comforts from an easier age or perhaps as Tim Hayward puts it, simply 'because the food in the UK is so damned good - even if it's taken us a while to realise the fact'.

He and his wife Alison are the proud owners of Fitzbillies in Cambridge where the famed Chelsea buns are once again rising in the ovens.

'One of our key hirings has been Gill, the original head baker who holds hundreds of old Fitzbillies' recipes in her head,' he tells me. 'I've been working with her on the Chelseas' and I can safely say that the secrets are fascinating. We'll be bringing back many of the old recipes and updating some where necessary but we won't mess with the buns.'

Over at Yorkshire institution Betty's Fat Rascals have become their biggest seller. A cross between a scone and a rock cake, these originated from the turf-griddled leftovers that were combined at the end of a day's baking. Product developer, Lesley Norris believes they're definitely seeing an upturn in the number of people treating themselves to these affordable delicacies.

So what about cup cakes? 'They're very easy for relatively unskilled people to make and sell as a premium item, says Scottish baker Alex Dalgetty. But it seems many of us would prefer a more traditional treat.

Every day Alex is up at 5am and in his baker's whites trying to contend with the demand for classic delicacies like Clootie Dumplings, Shortbreads , Black Buns and Selkirk Bannock.

Dating back from the 1800s, the Selkirk Bannock is a fruity loaf (invented on the Scottish borders by adding sugar, butter and sultanas to leftover dough) which Alex still makes using the recipe passed down through his family. He reckons the secret to making a proper one is in the lengthy (eight or nine hours) fermentation process.

So how do you feel about the Great British cake revival? And what's your favourite old school cake?

Comments

mooingzelda

27 July 2011, 1:05PM
mooingzelda

I've always preferred traditional cakes to the newer fads - they just taste so much better. My favourite is madeira cake, but I also love Victoria sponge and good old fruit cake. I've never taken to cupcakes - all the ones I've had have just been a bland spongy base topped with far too much overly sweet icing.

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andtiggertoo

27 July 2011, 1:06PM
andtiggertoo

I've never been a cup cake fan. Yukky icing. Bleurgh. I love sticky cakes, so parkin, chocolate fudge cake and lemon drizzle from more modern classics. From my childhood, I loved my mum's Magic Moments, Battenburg (although I only liked the marzipan and the white bits ;-)), proper Cornish saffron cake and shortbread made with a bit of ground rice. Mmmmm.

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Maxine

27 July 2011, 1:06PM
Maxine

I often make shortbread and Apple pie, I prefer older recipes with more natural ingredients.

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Maxine

27 July 2011, 1:08PM
Maxine

I see that the Chelsea bun recipe is not the original, does anyone have an original Chelsea bun recipe I could have?

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Elomelop

27 July 2011, 1:23PM
Elomelop

As a child I got to choose the type of cake my mum made for my birthday. I always chose Coffee Cake. Still love it to this day and now my 11-year old niece makes a mean Coffee Cake.

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Laney

27 July 2011, 1:26PM
Laney

Seed cake and coffee and walnut cake. Cup cakes have been around for years - they were called buns or fairy cakes when I was a kid or butterfly cakes if you took a cone out of the top filled it with something and put the top back on as 'wings'.

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Debs

27 July 2011, 1:45PM
Debs

Nothing beats a custard tart!

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Jo W

27 July 2011, 2:34PM
Jo W

I hate the synthetic overly sweet icing that comes with most cup cakes and sometimes find myself playing hunt the cake! Why is the ratio of cake to icing so ridiculously unbalanced? Having said that I'm a sucker for a bit of edible glitter, which is why I keep wasting my money in certain big name coffee houses in the hope that one day the cake's taste might match its appearance. I'm a school canteen ginger cake fan myself- it cost 16p when I was at school and was smothered in a thin layer of buttercream. The piece de resistance was the doggy choc drop that was placed on top. Yum!

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Clare Comrie

27 July 2011, 3:11PM
Clare Comrie

I have a fab recipe for "Tuck box Cake" which lasts ages & has dates & glacÃ© cherries in, GF ultimate Lemon Drizzle is top of guests choice as is my adaptation on the Rasberry & Almond cake, I use raspberry jam - (lots!) & almond essence as opposed to vanilla. A firm fave!

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rozmorgan

28 July 2011, 7:24PM
rozmorgan

Parkin! My boyfriend and I invited a fantastic one with some left over pumpkin purÃ©e I had from making pumpkin pies. Pumpkin parkin, our own recipe, is delicious. Also firm favourite is carrot cake.

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jenny

29 July 2011, 2:52PM
jenny

Does Bread Pudding count as Retro - i'd rather have a slab of Bread pudding from my local Artisan bakery (nowhere else compares) than a cupcake or slice of chocolate cake anyday!

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SUE

30 July 2011, 8:34AM
SUE

My Mum made a smashing Coffee Walnut cake (with Camp coffee of course) and she was the only one of the family that didn't like it!

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chrisc

30 July 2011, 1:35PM
chrisc

Does honey buns count as retro?. They taste better than the so called cakes that the shops pass off today. chrisc

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Odelle

31 July 2011, 6:49AM
Odelle

I always loved the pale, thick biscuits from school days that used to be served up with milk puddings. My mums curd tarts, ground almond cakes, cream slices, mince pies, scones, butterfly cakes, shortbread, bread & butter pudding with lots of nutmeg on top, custard tarts...all made on Sunday morning before lunch for a minimum of 14!

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Babs

1 August 2011, 9:07PM
Babs

What counts as retro? I've been making carrot cake for 25 years but I must admit it took a while to find the perfect carrot cake cupcake recipe though I only use half the ingredients for the topping, I mean why so much topping on cupcakes? I made fairy cakes for my Grandaughters birthday party using an old recipe from many years ago all they had was a bit of icing and a chocolate chip on top and everyone loved them. Odelle your house was obviously the place to be!!

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Sara

3 August 2011, 6:50PM
Sara

Where can you get lardy cake these days???? Local tesco used to do it but not for years now. Seems to have totally vanished in the SE.

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tweetiepie

3 August 2011, 11:22PM
tweetiepie

Mmmm carrot cake has to be hard to beat if you ask me!! Rocky road too! Sara, have you tried getting lardy cake from a bakery? I got some recently but can't remember where from....somewhere like Greggs may sell it?

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Jen

4 August 2011, 4:27PM
Jen

You cannot beat proper gingerbread.

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