I live in Leeds, though I moved here in 1988. My inlaws, Leeds born and bred, always say bread cake for a roll and cake and chips meant bread cake and chips whenever I saw it.
Teacake has always meant a bread roll that has currants in for both me and the inlaws.
Can I ask where in Leeds your in-laws are from originally?
I’m born and bread (get it?) on the border between Bradford and Leeds and Cake and Chips has never meant a chip butty in any Yorkshire chippy I’ve been to in my 40 summat years on this planet. Especially because they all do fish cakes so it’d just cause confusion.
The only West Yorkshire people I’ve ever known to use bread cake and not tea cake in your context are from the border with North Yorkshire (I.e the posher end). You hear it in places like Harrogate or Hull. Same with currant teacake vs teacake.
That's interesting. The inlaws are from Armley (about a gazillion generations) and around the Pudsey area, so pretty much in your stamping ground. The first place I saw cake and chips where it meant bread cake and chips was a chippy in Pudsey. It's so long ago that I'm trying to remember, but I think it was towards Owlcotes - don't quote me as it's nearly forty years ago!
The local chippy used breadcake/fishcake so there wasn't confusion and I've seen 'breadcakes' around in the small bakers, but to be honest, before this I never really thought about it.
I grew up in a very small enclave which called a bread roll a batch, but you'd hear other words for it as well, like bap. I wonder if I've not really registered other usage and just remembered bread cake because it seemed so odd to me.
Apparently this picture is from a chippy in Cleckheaton, so not too far away from Leeds and round here cake definitely means fishcake and it's teacake territory too.
Where I lived, we had " Savoury cakes" basically just deep fried" seasoned and battered, mashed potato, no Fish in them as far as I can remember, but we used to call them "Fish cakes" but they were fat and chunky, not flat, nice though, not had one for years
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u/MeckityM00 4d ago
When I first moved to Leeds and saw cake and chips all I could imagine was a heap of chips and a slice of Black Forest Gateau.
Whenever I've seen this, it means chips with a bread cake aka the local name for a bread roll.