Yorkshire Parkin for Bonfire Night: The Sticky Oatmeal and Treacle Ginger Cake That Gets Better for a Week

Parkin is the cake you bake on purpose a week early. It comes out of the oven firm and a little dry, and only after days wrapped in a tin does the treacle work its way back through the oats and the whole thing turns sticky, dark and faintly chewy, the texture that makes a cold slab of it in a coat pocket the right thing to eat while a bonfire catches. It is a northern English bake, Yorkshire and Lancashire both claim it, and it is fixed to 5 November more firmly than any other food.

Its paper trail is older than the fireworks. A history published at the end of September traces the earliest named record to a West Riding Quarter Sessions case of 1728, in which a woman called Anne Whittaker was accused of stealing oatmeal to make parkin, and notes that Leeds was calling 5 November "Parkin Night" by 1862. Why the cake attached itself to the Gunpowder Plot is honestly uncertain; what is certain is that by the Victorian period the two were inseparable.

It is having its usual seasonal moment. A Yorkshire sticky ginger parkin was refreshed on 24 October for this year's run-up, and a gluten free version from The Gluten Free Blogger, updated on 30 October with a new video, tells readers to bake it a week ahead. Both say the same thing the 1862 bakers knew: the waiting is the recipe.

Ingredients

Makes 16 squares from a 20 cm square tin. Total time about 1 hour 20 minutes (20 minutes preparation, 55 to 60 minutes baking), plus at least three days maturing in a tin.

• 200 g plain flour
• 125 g medium oatmeal
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 tablespoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon mixed spice
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon fine salt
• 150 g unsalted butter
• 100 g dark muscovado sugar
• 150 g golden syrup
• 100 g black treacle
• 75 ml whole milk
• 1 large egg, beaten
• 25 g stem ginger in syrup, finely chopped (optional)

Method

1. Heat the oven to 160C (140C fan, gas 3). Grease a 20 cm square tin and line the base and sides with baking paper, leaving a little overhang to lift the cake out later.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, oatmeal, baking powder, ground ginger, mixed spice, nutmeg and salt so the spices are evenly spread through the dry mix.
3. Put the butter, muscovado sugar, golden syrup and black treacle in a saucepan over a low heat. Warm gently, stirring now and then, until the butter has melted and the sugar has dissolved. Do not let it boil. Take the pan off the heat and let it cool for 5 minutes so it will not scramble the egg.
4. Pour the warm syrup mixture into the dry ingredients and stir with a wooden spoon until no dry flour remains. The batter will be thick and glossy.
5. Beat the milk into the egg, then stir it into the batter along with the chopped stem ginger if using. The mixture should loosen to a thick pouring consistency.
6. Scrape the batter into the tin, level the top and bake on the middle shelf for 55 to 60 minutes. It is done when the top is dark, springy to a light touch and a skewer pushed into the centre comes out clean or with only a few sticky crumbs.
7. Leave the parkin in the tin for 20 minutes, then lift it out by the paper onto a wire rack and cool completely. It will feel firmer and drier than you expect. That is correct.
8. Once cold, wrap the whole slab in its baking paper, then in foil, and put it in an airtight tin. Leave it for at least three days, and ideally five to seven, before cutting into 16 squares.

Tips, variations and storage

The oatmeal matters. Medium oatmeal gives the slightly nubbly crumb that separates parkin from ordinary gingerbread; rolled oats blitzed briefly in a food processor will do if you cannot find it, and the gluten free version above does exactly that with gluten free oats and flour. Black treacle brings the bitterness and colour; swapping it all for golden syrup makes a paler, sweeter cake that is pleasant but not parkin. For a Lancashire-leaning version, push the oatmeal up to 175 g and the flour down to 150 g. A pinch of black pepper with the ginger is an old trick that sharpens the spice.

Matured parkin keeps for two weeks in a tin and freezes well, wrapped, for up to three months. If you cut it on day one, serve it warm with custard and call it pudding, which is what northern households have always done with the first corner. For the fireworks, cut cold squares and wrap them in greaseproof paper; they travel better than anything with icing.

Bonfire Night falls on a Thursday this year, which means a parkin baked tonight will not be ready for the fire. Bake it anyway. It will be at its best by the weekend, when the sparklers are gone and the tin is the only part of the Fifth still worth opening.