David Fletcher, Tunstall Tortillas

Tunstall Tortillas

David Fletcher

Publisher
RRB Photobooks
Year
2025
ISBN
9781919318202
Specifications
Softcover
80 pages
Colour photographs of producers and their workplaces

Tunstall Tortillas by photographer David Fletcher is an affectionate portrait of the oatcake shops of Stoke-on-Trent and of the people who keep this Staffordshire tradition alive. The title is borrowed from Arthur Berry's poem 'Ode to the Oatcake', which describes the locally beloved griddle-cooked pancake variously as a 'Tunstall tortilla', a 'clay suzette' and a 'potteries papadum'. Originally from Stoke himself and now based in the New Forest, Fletcher returned to his hometown to photograph behind the counters and over the griddles of the city's surviving oatcake shops. The book pairs striking portraits of shop owners with documentary images of the making of the oatcake itself—batter on hot plates, the close, low-ceilinged backrooms, the daily ritual of opening, mixing, cooking and folding. Each business has its closely guarded recipe, often passed down within families. The work celebrates a regional food culture, the dignity of small independent businesses and the everyday Englishness of a city that takes its food traditions seriously.

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