Old Fashioned Yorkshire Parkin

Name: Old Fashioned Yorkshire Parkin
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 45 min
Total time: 60 min
Ingredients: 200 g Butter (Unsalted); 100 g Soft Dark Brown Sugar; 100 g Black Treacle; 150 g Golden Syrup; 110 g Medium Oatmeal (or roughly blitzed porridge oats); 180 g Self Raising Flour; 3/4 tsp Baking Powder; 3 tsp Ground Ginger; 2 Large eggs (lightly beaten); 2 tbs Milk

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This sticky old fashioned Yorkshire Parkin recipe contains oatmeal. It keeps really well and improves with time. Therefore, it can be made a couple of days before it's needed.

What is Yorkshire Parkin

A recipe for Old Fashioned Yorkshire Parkin should not be confused with a Ginger Cake or Ginger Bread recipe. It is often associated with Yorkshire and eaten around Halloween, Bonfire Night (Wiki), and guy fawkes.

It's a time of year when comfort baking is in full swing. True Yorkshire Parkin contains Oatmeal and any cake without it is simply a Ginger Cake/Bread and nothing more.

In fact when you look at the list of ingredients, it is very similar to Lancashire Parkin.

A good treacle Parkin recipe has to be moist, sticky and full of ginger and toffee flavours with a nutty texture coming from the medium oats, and deep toffee flavours created by the addition of dark black treacle.

How to make Yorkshire Parkin.

Making a Parkin cake, couldn't be easier. Once you've switched on the oven, weighed out all the ingredients, greased and lined your baking tin, you are ready to start baking.

The mixture is a little runny, which is why it's essential that you also line your loose bottomed cake tin with baking parchment. To help prevent any batter from oozing out.

Place the butter, black treacle, golden syrup, and brown sugar in a pan over low heat. Gently simmer until all the sugar and butter have melted. Take off the heat and leave to one side to cool a little.

Dry cake ingredients in green mixing bowls

Place all the dry ingredients consisting of Oatmeal, Flour, Baking Powder and Ginger into a large mixing bowl that is heatproof and gently mix everything together. Then pour the cooled sugar treacle mixture over the dry ingredients and mix until well combined.

Add the milk and eggs to the Parkin cake batter

Now is the time to add the eggs and milk, but add the milk first and give it a good mix. Then gradually add the eggs and mix until well combined. Remember that the mixture may still be a little warm, you don’t want scrambled eggs.

Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and bake in the oven for 35 - 45 mins or until baked, testing the centre of the cake with a skewer until it comes out clean.

Leave in the tin to cool for around 15 mins before removing from the tin onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Parkin can be eaten straight away. But it does improve with age by keeping tightly wrapped in an airtight container for 2 – 5 days, before cutting and eating.

Tips and FAQ's

Syrup vs Treacle - I used a mix of golden syrup and dark treacle in my list of Parkin ingredients. Dark treacle is often used when making bonfire toffee.
A word about Oatmeal - For this Parkin recipe I would only recommend that you use Medium Oatmeal rather than the larger Porridge or Whole Oats that are normally associated with making porridge. See my note below about using Porridge Oats.
Runny cake batter - This cake batter is a little runnier than normal sponge cake batter, which is why it's important to line your cake tin with baking parchment to stop the batter from leaking out of the tin.

What is Treacle?

Treacle is also known as Molasses outside the UK. It is a very think, dark sticky syrup made from partially refined sugar. There are several grades of treacle, ranging from Golden Syrup to dark black treacle.

What is Oatmeal?

Oatmeal, Medium Oatmeal or Pinhead Oatmeal are a finer grain of Oats and is often used to make Porridge. Not to be confused with Whole Oats. See my note below about using Porridge Oats.

How long does Parkin Keep?

Parkin improves with age by keeping tightly wrapped in an airtight container for 2 – 5 days, before cutting and eating.

Can I use Porridge Oats to Make Yorkshire Parkin?

You can use roughly blitzed Porridge oats in place of Medium Oatmeal, I've made it this way several times.

What is Yorkshire Parkin?

Yorkshire Parkin is a kind of Gingerbread. The difference between the two recipes is Parkin contains a form of Oats or Oatmeal, but Gingerbread does not. The taste and texture are also quite different. Parkin often contains dark Treacle as well as golden syrup, giving it that rich dark colour and flavour. Gingerbread, such as Gingerbread Biscuits, contains Golden Syrup with no dark treacle, which gives the Gingerbread Men and Gingerbread Houses, a light golden colour.

Other Ginger Flavoured Cakes that you may Like to Try

Sticky Ginger cake recipe - With a syrup glaze and a glace ginger topping. It's a lovely alternative to a parkin cake if you are looking for a Ginger cake that doesn't use Oatmeal.
Glace Ginger, Oat and White Chocolate Cookie bars - A lovely shortbread texture with a Ginger bite.

Bake Muffins

I've adapted this recipe into Treacle, Ginger and Oat Muffins They take less time to bake and are so much easier to hand out on Bonfire Night or BBQ at home. They are also ideal for charity events and school bake sales.

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Pinterest image of Yorkshire Parkin sliced and unsliced.

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