Lardy Cake

Lardy Cake a traditional English tea bread popular in country areas. It is made from bread dough enriched with lard and sugar and, usually, spices and dried fruit. The dough is rolled and folded several times to give a layered texture.

Lardy cakes were originally intended as special celebration cakes, made only at harvest time or for family festivals. Elizabeth David (1977) remarks that ‘It was only when sugar became cheap, and when the English taste for sweet things—particularly in the Midlands and the North—became more pronounced, that such rich breads or cakes were made or could be bought from the bakery every week.’