What carlin peas actually are
The pea at the centre of all this has several names depending on where you are — black peas, parched peas, carlin peas, maple peas — but it is a single distinct variety: a small, hard, dark-brown dried pea, rounder and sturdier than the split peas that go into soup, with a more earthy, almost nutty flavour once cooked. Hardy and well suited to British growing conditions, it has been part of the agricultural landscape of northern England for a very long time. You will not find it in most supermarkets, but it turns up reliably in markets across Lancashire and the North East, and from specialist suppliers, particularly as autumn arrives.
Dried, the pea is a deep brownish-purple. Soaked and simmered, it turns a rich, muddy brown — nothing like the vivid green of frozen peas or the grey-green of mushy peas. When properly cooked the texture is yielding but still holds its shape, and it is filling in a way that feels right for cold evenings.
Lancashire's Bonfire Night tradition
In Lancashire, eating black peas on or around Bonfire Night is so embedded that many families do not think of it as a tradition at all — it is simply what you do. The peas are soaked overnight, then simmered slowly until tender, ladled hot into a cup or small bowl, and dressed with malt vinegar. No garnish, no fanfare.
Street vendors at bonfire displays and fairgrounds have sold them this way for generations. Standing in a cold field with a warm cup of peas, the sharp hit of vinegar cutting through the earthiness — it is food that makes sense entirely in context. The name parched peas, used in some parts of Lancashire, refers to an older method of dry-roasting the dried peas before soaking, though the term is now used loosely for the soaked-and-simmered version too. Recipes vary from family to family, as they always do with this kind of local food.
Carlin Sunday in the North East
Across the Pennines, the same pea appears in a different context. In the North East — County Durham, Northumberland and parts of Yorkshire — Carlin Sunday falls on the fifth Sunday of Lent, two weeks before Easter. The peas are again soaked and cooked, but here more commonly finished with butter and sometimes a little sugar or rum rather than malt vinegar.
The origin stories attached to Carlin Sunday are numerous and contradictory enough that none should be stated as fact. Some involve shipwrecks and cargoes of peas; others are rooted in pre-Reformation fasting customs. The precise origin is not known, and the legends are probably best enjoyed as legends. What is clear is that the tradition is old, specific to a defined geography, and still observed.
The name may derive from an Old Norse word for an old woman or crone, or from a dialect word for the pea variety. Etymology is contested. What matters for the eater is the pea on the plate.
Where this sits among British pea traditions
Britain has a richer relationship with dried and processed peas than most people realise. As we explore in our pieces on mushy peas and pease pudding, the dried pea was a dietary staple across much of the country long before refrigeration made fresh vegetables available year-round. Mushy peas — made from dried marrowfat peas soaked and cooked to a thick, collapsing texture — are the chip-shop standard of the North and Midlands. Pease pudding, the dense, savoury set paste of split yellow peas cooked with a ham hock, belongs firmly to the North East, eaten with pork or spread cold on bread.
Carlin peas sit alongside these traditions rather than overlapping with them. They keep their shape in a way that mushy peas deliberately do not. They are served wet in a cup, not set firm like pease pudding. The malt vinegar seasoning links them to the broader northern street-food tradition — the same sharp condiment that goes on chips, on cockles, on anything eaten outdoors in the cold.
What connects all of these is the same underlying practicality: dried legumes, preserved through winter, made genuinely pleasurable by simple, long-established technique. The carlin pea just happens to have acquired two festivals in the process.
Finding and buying them
Outside the North of England, carlin peas can be elusive. Look for them from specialist British pulse suppliers, wholefood shops, or farm shops in the relevant regions. They are sometimes listed as maple peas or black badger peas — the names are used interchangeably by different suppliers. If you are buying around Bonfire Night, demand rises sharply in Lancashire, so source them a little early. Dried peas keep well in a cool, dry cupboard, so there is no urgency to use them immediately once you have tracked them down.
