Caraway seed cake Caraway seed cake Seed cake is a traditional British cake flavoured with caraway or other flavourful seeds. Caraway seeds have been long used in British cookery, and at one time caraway-seed biscuits were prepared to mark the end of the sowing of the spring wheat. These particular biscuits later evolved into this distinctively flavoured tea cake. James Matterer reports that recipes for seed cake are found in A.W.'s "Book of Cookrye" (1591) and "The English Huswife" by Gervase Markham (1615). The cake was popular in the 1700s, and through the Victorian era. Recipes for it are included in many early
Chorley cake brown in colour. The other difference is that the currants in the Eccles cake are often concentrated together in the middle while in the Chorley cake the fruit is usually evenly distributed. It is not uncommon to see some sugar added to the fruit, or sweeter raisins or sultanas used. Locals often refer to Chorley cake as Fly Pie. Also related to the Chorley cake is East Lancashire's "Sad Cake", made to a similar recipe. It was found in the Darwen, Blackburn, Accrington, Burnley, Colne, Nelson and Padiham areas and throughout the Rossendale area. Sad cake is often up to