Everything Nice: Ben Javens & a Parkin Recipe

I love bak­ing, and I espe­cial­ly enjoy mak­ing things that I’ve nev­er tast­ed before. So, I’m super excit­ed to share Every­thing Nice, a Brown Paper Bag series that com­bines sweet treats and illus­trat­ed prod­ucts (two of my favorite things!).

I’ve teamed up with Dave and Sal­ly of To Dry For and Beast in Show for Every­thing Nice, and I’m high­light­ing some of the awe­some illus­tra­tors that they work with. The UK-based busi­ness­es pro­duce things like tea tow­els, mugs, and cush­ions that are bright, col­or­ful, and will total­ly bright­en your day.

For this project, I chose 3 illus­tra­tors whose work I admired, and then I asked them what their favorite baked good was. Through­out the course of Every­thing Nice, I’ll make their sweet treat and show you how to do it, too. Plus, you’ll see their work in action.

The tea tow­el is by Lucie Sheri­dan, and the hap­py-look­ing mug is by Ben Javens.

I’m excit­ed to share the first install­ment of this series. Ben Javens is an awe­some illus­tra­tor who cre­ates hap­py, bold images. He also enjoys parkins, a sponge cake from North­ern Eng­land that uses molasses, gin­ger, oat­meal, and more.

Now, I’ve nev­er made (or eat­en) a parkin, and being from the US, I had to do a lit­tle research on medi­um oat­meal and gold­en syrup. The recipe is below. I hap­pen to have a kitchen scale, so the it made the mea­sure­ments for it easy peasy. I’d high­ly rec­om­mend one (because I suck at conversions).

Parkin

Prep time: 15 min­utes | Cook time: 1 hour
Source: BBC Good Food

• 200g but­ter, plus extra for greasing
• 1 large egg
• 4 tbsp milk
• 200g gold­en syrup
• 85g molasses
• 85g light soft brown sugar
• 100g medi­um oatmeal
• 250g self-rais­ing flour
• 1 tbsp ground ginger

1. Pre­heat the oven to 160C/320F. Line a 9 inch-square bak­ing pan with parch­ment paper. Beat the egg and milk togeth­er with a fork.

2. Melt the syrup, molasses, sug­ar, and but­ter in a sauce pan until the sug­ar has dis­solved. Remove it from the heat.

3. Mix togeth­er the oat­meal, flour, and gin­ger, and stir the dry ingre­di­ents into the syrup mix­ture. Then, add in the egg and milk.

4. Pour the bat­ter into the pre­pared pan and bake it for 50 min­utes — 1 hour. Of course, this depends on your oven. Mine took right around 50, although I checked on it after 45 min­utes. The cake should feel firm and look a lit­tle crusty on top.

Once cool, wrap it in parch­ment paper and foil. The BBC rec­om­mends keep­ing it in wraps for 3–5 days before eat­ing because it’ll become soft­er and stick­i­er the longer you leave it. Mine? I last­ed a day.

Per­fect for some couch time and books!

Beast in Show makes Ben’s babush­ka mini cush­ion. They also pro­duce the Bernard book by Rob Jones.

The next install­ment of Every­thing Nice will be in a cou­ple of weeks! Stay tuned.