{"id":4031,"date":"2014-04-26T09:23:49","date_gmt":"2014-04-26T09:23:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/xislblogs.xtreamlab.net\/slwoods\/?p=4031"},"modified":"2014-04-27T15:16:42","modified_gmt":"2014-04-27T15:16:42","slug":"how-old-is-the-staffordshire-oatcake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/?p=4031","title":{"rendered":"How old is the Staffordshire oatcake?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m currently reading <em>Portrait of the Potteries<\/em> by Bill Morland, published by Robert Hale Ltd. in 1978.<\/p>\n<p>Being a local delicacy, oatcakes (<a href=\"http:\/\/xislblogs.xtreamlab.net\/slwoods\/?p=653\" title=\"Forbidden food\"><em>posts passim<\/em><\/a>) get an honourable mention. Indeed on page 25 Mr Morland does more than praise them, he speculates as to their origin (<em>although he hyphenates oat-cakes. Ed.<\/em>):<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>It is nothing like the Scottish oat-cake, but is rather like a brown and nobbly pancake made from draught-porridge. Incredibly economical to product, oat-cakes are very nourishing and sustaining. They are a symbol of the isolation and conservatism of the valley, since they appear to be an <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Iron_Age\">iron-age<\/a> survival.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<figure id=\"attachment_655\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-655\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/23\/2012\/11\/oatcake_web.jpg\" alt=\"Staffordshire oatcake before filling\" width=\"600\" height=\"450\" class=\"size-full wp-image-655\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/sites\/23\/2012\/11\/oatcake_web.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/sites\/23\/2012\/11\/oatcake_web-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-655\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Oatcake awaiting filling<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>However, Mr Morland provides no evidence of the Iron Age origins of the Staffordshire oatcake, although one would have thought that, as an archaeology teacher for Keele University&#8217;s Adult Education Department at the time of publication, he would have realised the importance of empirical evidence.<\/p>\n<p>If anyone can shed light on the (pre)history of the Staffordshire oatcake, please feel free to comment below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m currently reading Portrait of the Potteries by Bill Morland, published by Robert Hale Ltd. in 1978. Being a local delicacy, oatcakes (posts passim) get an honourable mention. Indeed on page 25 Mr Morland does more than praise them, he speculates as to their origin (although he hyphenates oat-cakes. Ed.): It is nothing like the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,17],"tags":[36,16,25],"class_list":["post-4031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-translation-and-language-related-matters","category-oddities","tag-comment","tag-english-usage","tag-food"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4031"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4039,"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4031\/revisions\/4039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.slwoods.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}