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A Bakewell cake

A Bakewell pudding

The Old Original Bakewell Pudding Shop

A Bakewell tart is a traditional English baked dessert tart or cake. It is a distant cousin of the original "Bakewell Pudding" (also covered in this article).

It consists of a shortcrust pastry shell, spread with jam and covered with a sponge-like filling enriched with ground almonds (known as Frangipane). They may also be covered with nuts such as almonds and peanuts. Alternative flavours, including blackcurrant, strawberry and apple are also produced.

A Cherry Bakewell is a small cake, covered with a top layer of icing and a single central half-cherry, also known as a Bakewell Cake.

To some extent, the terms cake and tart are used interchangeably, though most insist the names are recipe specific. Recipes abound, for example those given by Ben Mathews (1839), Eliza Acton (1845), K Morgan , M Bates and Mrs Beeton (1861), and modern commercial examples are to be found in most cake shops and on every supermarket shelf. The name only became common in the 20th Century; the dish was previously known as Bakewell Pudding.

The Derbyshire town of Bakewell claims to be the home of the authentic Bakewell Pudding and many believe it to originally come from the Rushbottom Lane district. A recipe still made there consists of a puff pastry shell with a layer of jam, covered with a filling of eggs, sugar, butter and almonds.

The tale told to tourists is that this dish is an accidental invention of the 1860s, which occurred when a nobleman visiting the White Horse Inn (now called The Rutland Arms) at Bakewell ordered strawberry tart. The cook, instead of stirring the egg mixture into the cake, spread it on top of the jam. However, this claim is almost certainly apocryphal, as the pudding was by then already well-known, and its antecedents can be traced back to medieval times.

• Alan Davidson (Ed.) (1999). The Oxford Companion to Food. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-211579-0. 
• Eliza Acton (1845). Modern Cookery for Private Families. 
• Isabella Beeton (1861). Beeton's Book of Household Management. 

• Buxton Spa Bakeries Ltd - National Producer of Bakewell Tarts and Bakewell Puddings
• The Old Original Bakewell Pudding Shop Website
• BakewellUK - Your Virtual Guide to Bakewell
• A recipe for Bakewell Pudding.
• History of the Rutland Arms