Eccles cake
An Eccles cake is a small, round cake filled with currants and made from flaky pastry with butter, sometimes topped with demerara sugar.Name and origin
Eccles cakes are named after the English town of Eccles in North West England.
It is not known who invented the recipe, but James Birch is credited with being the first person to sell Eccles cakes commercially; he sold the cakes from his shop, at the corner of Vicarage Road and St Mary's Road, now Church Street, in the town centre, in 1793.
Eccles cakes do not have Protected Geographical Status, so may be manufactured anywhere and still labelled as "Eccles" cakes.Similar pastries
The Banbury cake is an oval cake from Banbury, Oxfordshire, similarly filled with currants.
The Chorley cake is flatter, made with shortcrust pastry rather than flaky pastry and has no sugar topping.
The Blackburn cake is named after the town of Blackburn, Lancashire, and is made with stewed apples in place of currants.
