Funeral cake?

You can have your cake BUT you can't eat it!
How about that for Food for thought!

BIG Thanks to Nancy Birtwhistle for judging 

our latest cake competition

 What a way to go, Respect for an old Northern Custom, according to a ”Traditional Food in Yorkshire” guide (John Donald, 1987) and Peter Brears, a professor at the University of Leeds documented one instance when Funeral Cakes tied with black crepe were delivered to homes in the village as invitations to the funeral. 

Thanks to Polly Hannah Cakes of Epworth 

Did you know that Funeral Cakes were a Yorkshire World Collections object, one of 100 chosen by young people aged 16-24 as part of the London Cultural Olympiad programme, Stories of the World.

Funeral Cakes are a Yorkshire Dales tradition, with links back to the Arval bread of the Vikings. Apparently they are decorated, shortcake-like biscuits flavoured with caraway seeds and wrapped in paper printed with the deceased's favourite verse or hymn. The cakes were given to visitors to the household and those attending the funeral and marked with a hand-carved wooden stamp to decorate the funeral cakes and were made in the late 19th Century.

The tradition of Funeral Cakes is not just limited to the Dales: many regions of Northern England have some sort of cake or biscuit specially eaten at funerals. The biscuits were traditionally decorated with a heart symbol to represent the soul of the deceased.

We had to show this as this is a totally edible sculpture our judge made for the display as mentioned in the Daily Mail & the Economist in September 2014

All edible chocolate 

Now back to some great cake entries 

Remembrance Cake — The Good Luck Peach Cake are but a few ideas, a Cake honouring the celebration of life. The peaches carry ancient Chinese associations of happiness, luck and immortality. Re-created from vintage recipes using fresh peaches for their harvest flavour as well as for their symbol of harmony, they bring you sweet goodness from the past, transformed into something fresh and new.

So we challenge you to break out your best wooden spoon ’cause there’s no electric mixer required.  start loading it up with little chunks of goodness, like white chocolate bits, coconut, white almonds and fine-chopped dates, and don’t forget the key ingredient — happiness! Celebrate a life and put a smile on the face of the congregation

Polly Hannah cakes of Epworth 

Thanks to Doncaster Carers Centre 

With your help we want offer to share step-by-step methods so that we may bring  heritage cakes to life again so that you may help carry on the fine custom of baking a special Funeral Cake for family and friends bonded together to share a meal following a funeral, memorial event or Celebration of Life service.

There are lots and lots of funeral cake & biscuit recipes in books and on the web but perhaps we can really discover some original local recipes from around our area? You can send in your recipes to Respect Funeral Cake & Biscuit Competition via the web at www.respectgb.co.uk via e-mail to ideas@respectgb.co.uk or mail to Respect, The Estate Office, Morton Hall Morton Nr Gainsborough DN21 3AA