A soft, tangy flatbread made from a fermented oat batter and cooked on a hot griddle. Pliable on the day it is made, it dries and keeps for weeks, ready to be reheated or spread with butter.

Why this dish? Wheat bread was expensive and scarce in the Pennines; modest Yorkshire families like that of Pastor Brontë lived on these fine oat flatbreads, which were dried on a rack suspended from the ceiling.

Here is our true bread, we folk of the hills — not the wheat of the towns, but hardy oats. I would mix the oatmeal into a thin batter and leave it to sour overnight near the hearth, until it smelled of good leaven; then I poured it onto the heated griddle. Afterwards, they were hung on the rack and dried there, stiff as parchment, patiently waiting to be revived with a little warmth. Frugal, you say? We simply called it living.

How it was made : These oatcakes ("haverbread") were hung on a wooden rack fixed to the kitchen ceiling, called the "bread creel", where they dried and kept for weeks. Reheated, they became edible again and accompanied cheese, butter, or broth.

The contemporary twist : Served folded like a wrap around a farmhouse Yorkshire cheddar and a dash of pickle — the oatcake as Pennine street food.

Charlotte Brontë · Charactorium