There are many variations on the making and baking of parkin – the Yorkshire Cookery Book, published in 1917, for example, showed seventeen versions! However, this recipe gets somewhere near to how it was originally made – with oatmeal.

An early reference to oatmeal as a staple ingredient was at the West Riding Quarter Sessions of 1728, when Anne Whittaker was accused of stealing oatmeal to make parkin.

The original recipe would have used a coarsely-ground oatmeal – and probably dripping, too – but this version spares you the dripping.  And the oatmeal you are likely to use today will almost certainly be a more refined version of the type that poor old Annie pinched.

Ingredients

• 8 oz (225g) plain flour
• 8 oz (225g) medium oatmeal
• 4 oz (113g) brown sugar
• 1 level teaspoon ground ginger
• 4 oz (113g) butter
• 8 oz (225g) black treacle
• 1 egg
• ½  teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 5 fl oz  (¼ pint ) milk

Method

1. Melt the sugar, butter and syrup over a low heat.
2. Beat the egg and add to the syrup mix with some of the milk
3. Sift the flour, oatmeal and ginger into a bowl and pour in the syrup mix.
4. Dissolve the bicarbonate of soda in the remaing milk and add to the rest of the mix.
5. Stir well, then transfer the mixture to a greased flat baking tin, e.g. 11″ x 9″ x 2″ deep
6. Bake until firm in a moderate oven (about 1 hour).
7. Keep it in a tin for a week before eating – it becomes deliciously stickier by the day.

Source: Mary Hanson Moore (1980) A Yorkshire Cookbook published by David & Charles.

See also a parkin recipe without oatmeal at Parkin (version 2)