Slightly sweetened yeast-raised enriched white wheatflour buns, c5ins diameter, 1½ins thick, medium-high bake, with a with modest admixture of dried fruit and spice. Usually split, toasted and served with butter.

The word 'teacake' is known at least since a report of Friday 21 February 1800 in the 'Stamford Mercury', Lincolnshire; "It being the Custom in Kew for the bakers to have hot Tea-cakes in the Afternoon", where it could signify any type of cake taken with tea from a plain bread bun to a fancy cake. But "teacake' is now substantially synonymous in England with this style of lightly fruited and spiced sweet bread bun, which seems to have originated in Northern England or Southern Scotland and gradually spread throughout the British Isles, though there remain pockets where the earlier usage of 'teacake' survives. See: Yorkshire (Plain) Teacake, Bread Names




Amazingly, Foods of England can't find any receipt for the modern type of fruited teacake by that, or a similar, name before about 1980. Can you help find more about Fruited Teacakes? raise an issue on GitHub



2015