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Ben W Bell Soda Bread Farl 05 June 2007.jpg
A soda bread farl. This would have been connected to the rest of the bread along the straight upper and right edges
Type Bread shape
Cookbook: Farl  Media: Farl

A farl (reduced form of the Scots fardel) is any of various quadrant-shaped flatbreads and cakes, traditionally made by cutting a round into four pieces.

In Northern Ireland, the term generally refers to soda bread and to potato bread or cakes (potato farls). While soda bread can also be baked as a normal loaf, that used in an Ulster fry breakfast is made as farls (that is to say, flat rounds about 3/4 inch thick which are then cut into quarters). Modern commercially mass-produced potato farls, however, are often rectangular in form.

In Scotland today, the word is used less than in Northern Ireland, but a farl can be a quarter piece of a large flat scone, bannock, or oatcake. It may also be used for shortbread when baked in this particular shape.[1]


The word may be related to fallaid in some way. [weasel words] However, the Dictionary of the Scots Language says that farl is a shorter form of fardel, the word once used in some parts of Lowland Scotland for "a three-cornered cake, usually oatcake, generally the fourth part of a round". In earlier Scots fardell meant a fourth or quarter.[1][dead link]


A farl is made by spreading the dough on a griddle or frying pan in a rough circular shape. The circle is then cut into four equal pieces and cooked. Once one side is done the dough is flipped to cook the other side.

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  1. ^ a b "Farl". Dictionary of the Scots Language. Retrieved 2008-11-08. 

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