RUSHDEN historian George Bayes has brought back memories of mouthwatering Sunday joints carried home from local bakehouses.

Mr Bayes, 80, of South Park, Rushden, has recalled the "sizzling smell of roasted succulence" as the oven doors opened, in a special article published in a national magazine.

The winter edition of This England features his nostalgic memories of "our bakehouse Sunday dinners."

The custom of families taking their traditional Sunday joints, surrounded by a Yorkshire-type pudding mix in tins to the local bakehouse, continued well after the first world war.

But Mr Bayes said: "For many years afterwards people would extol the superiority of bakehouse cooking. Its phasing out was just part of the price paid for progress.

"Happily that savoury aroma still hangs in the air down memory lane."

Mr Bayes recalls the fortunes and misfortunes of Sunday feasts when Rushden's bakehouses thrived before the introduction of regulo heat controls on gas cookers.

His article is the latest in a number of writings on nostalgic themes. He is also the author of a history of Rushden's Baptist movement entitled 'These Years Have Told'.