Northern England
Northern England is a broadly-defined region of England which forms the northern part of that country. When defined using traditional counties, the North is generally said to consist of Cumberland, County Durham, Lancashire, Northumberland, Yorkshire and Westmorland, with Cheshire also often being included. For statistical purposes, Northern England is made up of the combined statistical regions of North East England, North West England and Yorkshire and the Humber, and has a population of around 15 million; these regions are defined by local authority areas, not counties, but cover an area similar (but not identical) to those seven counties, with the addition of northern Lindsey in Lincolnshire.
Culture
Cuisine
Impressions of Northern English cuisine are still shaped by the working-class diet of the early twentieth century, which included high calorie foods and alcoholic beverages such as ales, and is often considered somewhat unhealthy. Foods such as sausage rolls and meat pies have long been considered characteristic of northern cuisine. The bakery chain Greggs, which was founded in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1951 and has since expanded around the UK from the 1970s onwards, is regarded by some to be integral to northern identity. Other bakery chains in the north include Poundbakery, which operate in Lancashire, Yorkshire, the North Midlands and North Wales.
A variety of alcoholic beverages, in particular beers, are made across the north of England. The first ever record of brewing in Great Britain is from the Roman fort at Vindolanda in the present-day county of Northumberland, where an inscription from c. 100 AD records an Atrectus Cervesarius (Atrectus the Brewer). Ales have long been associated with the north, with classic examples including Newcastle Brown Ale, John Smith's, Black Sheep and Boddingtons.