By Keighley’s Mike Armstrong, an award-winning master baker with a big passion for baking...

THIS week's recipe takes us to the north-east coast of Yorkshire and the local speciality coble cake, sold in only a handful of family-run bakeries and tearooms around the Staithes and Whitby area.

I'm always keen to try out any Yorkshire recipes and found this amazing cake thanks to someone who asked me if I had a recipe for it after she had visited a harbourside tearoom in the seaside village of Staithes.

I am up for a challenge but trying to recreate this old recipe did prove difficult as it is not well documented – there were some mentions, but I couldn't find the recipe anywhere on the internet. All I had to go on was that the cake was a spiced sponge, filled with apple puree and served with cream, which the internet seems in agreement about! I was happy to oblige – this was all the detail I needed to produce my own version of a Yorkshire coble cake.

This cake is named after the traditional fishing boats used locally, with the coble being a type of open boat. The coble boat was developed on the north-east coast of England and had a distinctive shape, being flat-bottomed and high bowed to cope with the particular conditions prevalent in the area. Its flat bottom allowed for launching from shallow, sandy beaches; an advantage where the wide bays and inlets provided little shelter from stormy weather. Fishermen required boats with high bows to sail in the dangerous North Sea and particularly to launch into the surf. The boat's design contains relics of Norse influence, and Dutch origin, with the craftsmanship giving them a long working life.

There are some lovely tearooms around Yorkshire, and one thing I always notice is the fancy patisseries favouring good, hearty generous Yorkshire portions!

After leafing through my entire collection of recipe books to find something near to coble cake, I gave up and made my own sweet version. It's an easy recipe which didn't present me with any problems, I just hope I have done the coble cake justice and made it available for everyone to enjoy!

RECIPE

YORKSHIRE COBLE CAKE

Ingredients:

200g/7oz butter, softened

200g/7oz caster sugar

4 eggs, beaten

200g/7oz self-raising flour, sifted

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon grated nutmeg, freshly grounded if possible

1 1/2 teaspoons mixed spice

250ml jar of Bramley apple sauce or homemade apple puree

Serve with thick or whipped cream

Method:

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/160C fan/Gas Mark 4 and then line and butter two 20cm/8in Victoria sandwich tins.

2. Beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, then beat in the eggs gradually.

3. Add the milk and fold in the flour and all the spices until the batter is smooth, then spoon the batter equally into the prepared tins and level.

4. Bake for around 20 minutes or until the sponge is pulling away from the edge of the tin and has a nice golden colour.

5. Leave to cool in the tins for 20 minutes before turning out onto a cooling wire.

6. Assemble the cake by placing one cake, flat side up, on a serving plate, then spread over the apple sauce and sandwich together, dusting over a little icing sugar and serve in generous slices with whipped cream.