I’m not into cake stops – but – I made an exception to rate five British delicacies in one ride

As a general rule, I don’t stop for cake. I’ve nothing against it, but I don’t drink coffee and I don’t have time for leisurely cafe rides – if my family found out I was sitting around chatting and scoffing cake on a Sunday morning, there would be hell to pay. OK, it’s the guilt, too: I’m 51, and I’m worried about all that sugar and fat going straight to my hips. For this ride, though, I would be stopping for cake – because this ride was all about cake. My plan was to link together north-west England locations places famous for their cakes, stopping at each to try their eponymous specialities, forming a 215km route from Bakewell to Chorley and back.

It was not an adventure I was prepared to take on alone. I called up my old mate Chris Moores to join me. He’s strong, never rides slow, and he’s great for moral support once you run out of energy. But at little over five feet tall, he’s useless for taking shelter behind. The idea for the adventure, the spark that lit the fuse, or the candle on the cake, was Bakewell, a town just down the road from me, and worldfamous for its puddings and tarts. Which other local towns have cakes named after them, I wondered – and could I link them together to make one massive cake-themed ride?

The first one was easy: Eccles – everyone has heard of that cake. A few miles up the road is Chorley, which also has a cake. Now we were beginning to scrape the barrel, or the cake tin, but apparently the Manchester tart is a thing. Bingo, that would work, albeit with Manchester adding the challenge of sprawling urban roads.

A small breakfast was allowed before we set off to the start at the Lime Lounge Coffee House in Bakewell, saving our appetites for a couple of slices of the sickly sweet Bakewell tart. First things first: a Bakewell tart is different from a Bakewell pudding. The pudding came first, originating in the early 1800s, and it consists of a flaky pastry base, a layer of jam, topped with an egg-and-almond paste filling. The tart, on the other hand, wasn’t introduced until the 20th Century, and consists of a shortcrust pastry shell filled with jam and frangipane, topped with almonds and icing. We opted to start with the tart because we wanted to get a pudding from the original pudding shop, not open until 9am, so that would have to wait until the end.