Sally Lunn

This recipe was featured on our social media series "Flavors of the Mountain Past."

A popular colonial recipe that made its way across the Atlantic is Sally Lunn. It’s a large bun or teacake typically baked with milk and sugar and toasted with butter. It was popular among colonists from England who brought it over to the U.S., and many southern colonies had made their own variations of it. The origins of the name “Sally Lunn” are highly debated. The most popular theory is that the name derived from Solange Liron, later anglicized to Sally Lunn, who was a French Huguenot refugee. Sally worked in a bakery in Bath, England in the 1680s and introduced a rich, brioche-style, yeasted bread from her homeland. Locals and travelers quickly grew fond of the bread, and many colonists brought it to the American colonies, eventually finding its way to southern Appalachia. You can visit Sally’s home in Bath, which many believe is the oldest house in the city.

Cover image credit: Wiki Commons.

Recipe from the book “Potlikker, Pones and Potables.”