You are here: Home / Recipes / Seasonal Recipes / All Year Recipes / A Northumberland Cottage Kitchen Recipe: Stotty Cake (Stottie Cake)
Stottie Cake is made from ordinary white bread dough, but due to the one rise and a slow bake, it creates a chewy bread reminiscent of sour dough, which makes a fabulous vehicle for butter, jam, treacle and cheese.
This article and recipe was previously shared on the Kenwood site, where I shared an old family recipe that used their Kenwood Titanium Chef mixer.
Traditional Stottie Recipe
A rather plain and flat looking disc of bread, and yet to many people in the North East of England the Stotty Bread is an important and potent symbol of their identity and region.
It’s the bread of my childhood, linked forever in my memory to my grandmother’s old stone cottage and warm, happy days sitting around a big old kitchen table with a flickering fire and the wind howling outside.
Stotties, as they are called in the plural, are born of thrift and frugality; at the end of a long day of baking, as most bread was made at home until fairly recently.
Stottie Cakes From Oats In The North, Wheat From The South: The History Of British Baking, Savoury And Sweet By Regula Ysewijn
Any excess white bread dough that was left over was simply shaped and rolled into a large disc, and thrown on to the bottom of the oven, where it baked in an initial burst of heat before continuing to cook as the oven cooled.
This baking method is what gives the Stotty Cake it’s crusty but soft exterior and yet a rather pleasant chewy crumb, and that unique “Stotty” taste too. A cake it is not, but a simple and homely regional loaf of bread.
My mother still talks about my grandmother’s Stotty Cakes……she remembers sitting at the kitchen table as a child and tearing chunks from the freshly baked loaf, then spreading butter on to the warm pieces of bread before adding crumbly Cheshire cheese.
Oven Bottom Muffins Recipe
My grandmother’s recipe remained a secret for many years after her death, and then one day my mum found an old hand-written recipe in the back of a Be-Ro cookbook, where she had written down the basic principals of how to make a Stotty, and so the secret family recipe was released.
They maybe be plain to look at with none of the fancy decorations, glazes and cuts that other bread loaves have, but as soon as you tear off a piece of bread, all warm and crusty, and then spread some butter on so it melts into golden pools of saltiness, you will understand the alchemy of this slow-baked bread, as how it is inextricably linked to happy childhood days and simple suppers at an old cottage table.
As well as cheese, and jam and treacle (golden syrup), a Stotty Bread is the perfect bread for sandwiches, and if you have ever visited the North East of England, or if you live there, you will know that the classic sandwich of choice made with Stotty Cake is ham and pease pudding.
Ham And Pease Pudding Sandwich Made From Stottie Cake, A Traditional Bread From North East England
My grandmother was an excellent pease pudding maker, as is my mum, but I have to admit to resorting to the ready-made tinned version sometimes, when time is short, although it is still delicious when spread onto warm bread with a slice of home-cooked ham.
Our family recipe is always better if made with the remnants of some basic white bread dough, and cooked on the bottom of a hot oven that has been turned off to cool, but you can replicate the method for today with the recipe I am about to share below.
Don’t forget to serve it on a wooden bread board in the middle of the table, with salted butter, cheese, pease pudding and ham too, if you like. Although this bread is perfect all year around, it always seems to taste better when eaten on a cold winter’s evening with the hiss of a log fire and the warm glow of oil lights flickering……or is that just in my memory, maybe.
Geordie Bakery Launches Nationwide Stottie Delivery Service
1. If using fresh yeast crumble it into a jug and then add the white pepper, sugar and a little tepid water to mix. Place somewhere warm for 10 to 15 minutes so it can start to “work” it is ready to use when it becomes frothy.
2. Put the bread flour and salt into a large mixing bowl and make a well in the centre, pour in the yeast mixture and the remaining water. If using dried yeast, just sprinkle the yeast in to the flour at this stage, with the sugar and white pepper and add the water as before.
3. Mix and then knead the dough until it is smooth and elastic. (The word stotty is believed to be derived from the local word of “stotting” which means to bounce, and I remember my grandmother “bouncing” her bread on the kitchen table for ages! So, don’t be shy when kneading.) This bread needs to be well kneaded for at least ten minutes.
Yorkshireman's Recipe For Stottie Cake
4. Cover the bowl with a clean tea towel and set to one side, somewhere warm, to allow the dough to rise. This will take about an hour, and the dough should have doubled in size before you can use it.
6. Put the dough onto a floured board and divide it into two equal pieces; roll the dough out to make two large flat discs, about 1” (2/5cm) thick and then stick the end of a rolling pin in the middle of the dough to make an indentation. You can also prick the top of the bread with a fork too.
7. Place the Stotty Cakes onto the prepared baking sheets and bake in the pre-heated oven for 15 minutes, before turning the oven off and leaving them in there for up to half an hour to continue to bake.
Large Stottie Cakes
Our family recipe is always better if made with the remnants of some basic white bread dough, and cooked on the bottom of a hot oven that has been turned off to cool.This is a Traditional Stottie Recipe which is a simple, round, flat, yeasty bread loaf with a distinct indent in the center. An iconic part of the culinary heritage of the North East of England that’s usually used for sandwiches, but is also perfect served warm with a little butter.
There are a few dishes that are very nostalgic for those of us from the North of England. Minced Beef and Dumplings, Pease Pudding and this Stottie. In typical British fashion, this bread comes with a few names: Stottie, Stotty and Stotty Cake.
A lot of slang is used in the North East of England and that’s how this bread gets its name. “Geordie” (jór-dee) is the name of the slang spoken in Newcastle. Stottie comes from the slang word to ‘Stot’ or ‘to bounce’. It is said that because they used to make the loaves so heavy and dense, if you drop them they would just bounce! Amazing.
Stottie Cakes (stotty Buns)
This classic recipe is how mothers and grandmothers (including my own) have made Stotties in the North of England for 50 years. The round loaf of bread is typically cut into 4 triangle pieces then sliced in half lengthwise to enjoy simply with butter, as a side dish to a meal or used as the bread in a sandwich.
Originating from Newcastle in the North East of England (not far from my home city) and first published in the Daily Mirror in 1949, with no recipe. They quite simply said: just roll bread dough out until it is 2.5 cm (1-inch) thick, then make a dimple in the center and bake. Clearly they figured it’s
If you’ve ever been to England, you’ve probably seen a bakery chain called ‘Greggs’. They’ve been making Stottie’s for almost 50 years. They stopped in 2015 only to recently return to making and selling Stottie due to popular demand and simply to revive the age old tradition.
Newcastle Fans Bring Home Bread For Royal Navy Veteran
There are other cities around the U.K. that have similar recipes. They’re called ‘Oven Cakes”, which are bread cakes or oven bottom cakes because they are baked in the lower bottom of the oven.
This is a 2 rise (proof) bread. The first rise will double in size. Then the 2nd rise will not yield much volume due to it being rolled out flat, and this is what you want. You don’t want it too risen – as it must keep its distinctive flat shape.
Stottie makes great sandwich bread that is cut into triangles. It’s most popularly served with ham and pease pudding (yellow split pea puree, picture above). Or, you can enjoy the freshly baked bread simply buttered and served on the side of a meal. And one of my favorites is to use it for mopping up the gravy from Bangers and Mash with Onion Gravy. A serious treat, right there.A stottie cake is a disc of bread which is bakes slowly in the oven. This gives it a distinctive chewy texture making it perfect for a lunchtime sandwich.
Stottie Cake (stotty)
I first discovered stottie cakes when I came to North East England as a student. Hungry and between lectures I was searching for a
0 Komentar