Happy Bonfire Night! This is my third Guy Fawkes Day in England and, would you believe it, this is the first time I’ve ever tried making parkin?

I’ve actually had the recipe bookmarked for a long time–not for Bonfire Night celebrations, but simply because it was eggless and a traditional British recipe and looked so very, very delicious.

And it turns out that parkin not only sounds good on paper, it tastes even better. The best way to describe it, in my opinion, is to say that it’s flapjacks and gingerbread baked in the same pan.

(If that didn’t sell the idea to you, I don’t know what would.)

Before I looked into the recipe a bit more, I had held the vague notion that parkin was the standard treat for Bonfire Night celebrations all over Britain, but apparently it’s actually a very Northern dish, with two main varieties hailing from Yorkshire and Lancashire respectively.

My recipe is Lancashire style, because it contains golden syrup and added sugar in addition to the treacle.

I didn’t even know that there were two styles until after I made the recipe though, so I disclaim any partisan bias towards one over the other. I shall try the Yorkshire style next year. I promise.

At any rate, have a lovely Bonfire Night, see some fantastic fireworks, stay safe and, of course, eat lots of parkin.

Lancashire-style Parkin

Ingredients:

125 g. unsalted butter

125 g. golden syrup

65 g. black treacle

250 g. muscavado sugar

185 g. plain (all-purpose) flour

3/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

250 g. porridge oats

1/2 cup (120 ml) milk

1 ball stem ginger, finely diced

 

Technique:

1. Line an 8-inch square baking tin with parchment paper. Grease the sides of the tin. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.
2. In a medium saucepan, combine the butter, golden syrup, treacle and sugar.
3. Melt over gentle heat, stirring occasionally to prevent the sugar from catching on the bottom of the pan.
4. In a large bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, ground ginger and oats.
5. Pour the hot sugar mixture over the oat mixture and mix well.
6. Stir through the stem ginger.
7. Pour into the prepared tin and smooth the top.
8. Bake until dark gold and springy to the touch, about 40 minutes.
9. Let the parkin cool in the pan before slicing into squares. But don’t necessarily let it cool off quite all the way before trying it–it’s lovely still warm!
10. Store in an airtight container. I’ve read that the longer parkin sits, the stickier and scrummier it gets. I can only personally verify that it’s even better the second day than the first–mine did not get to sit around very long!

Yield: 8-12 servings