WHAT are we looking at here? Gravy rings or doughnuts.

A harmless enough questions you might think, but the question – posed by our columnist Squinter in an innocent attempt to see if the traditional name for the Belfast delicacy has endured – sparked a passionate online debate that has exposed deep-fried divisions.

The good news for those of you sentimentally attached to the old ways is that a majority of the hundreds of contributors to the lively conversation still plump for gravy ring.

But the responses revealed social and geographical differences in how the artery-bashing favourite is described. Most of Belfast and virtually all of Derry cling to the gravy ring, while pockets of the city and rural areas were left flummoxed by the term – and how on earth the word gravy came to be connected a sweet delicacy. Turns out that across the island of Ireland in years gone by lard/cooking oil and gravy were interchangeable terms, and since the gravy ring is not baked but deep fried – the sugared delicacy became the gravy ring.

The debate is still raging online, but here’s a taster of the sweet and sour contributions that have propelled a home bakery favourite back into the spotlight. 

• Gravy rings when I was younger but my kids won’t accept that now so have had to change to donuts! LINSEY

• Gravy rings. I remember watching the fancy machine that made them on a stand at the Ideal Home Exhibition. A conveyor belt that brought the dropped batter through a “gravy” trough. Out the other end and dipped in sugar. Delicious. RUTH

• Gravy ring? You’ve made that up. ÉAMONN

• Doughnuts. I know some people called them gravy rings because they were deep fried in lard, oil or beef dripping. SUSAN

• What in the name of Jaysus is a gravy ring? Is it a pint of Bisto with a sugary doughnut? GRÁINNE

AUTHENTIC: Some say it's not a gravy ring if it hasn't been deep fried like these
2Gallery

AUTHENTIC: Some say it's not a gravy ring if it hasn't been deep fried like these

• Gravy rings. No other answer exists. ÉIRE GO BRACH CSC

• Gravy rings. Housecoat. Water boots. It’s a different world in the West. HOHENSTAUFEN

• Gravy rings. I think it is an age thing. Like Paris buns, diamonds, snowballs. When baps were simply baps, not Belfast baps. I went to Barney Hughes' every morning at 6.30 as a boy – cheap bread and broken buns. Carried home in a pillowcase. MICHAEL
 
• Gravy rings, and if you ever stood in Woolworths waiting on them cooking and coming out of the fat on a conveyor before getting sprinkled with sugar, you’d know why. Pity you can’t get them hot and fresh like that any more. JOSEPH
 
• Gravy rings. Doughnuts have jam fillings. DAMIAN
 
• Doughnuts. Gravy rings are these except with a chocolate topping and no dusting of sugar. GRÁINNE
 
• Gravy rings in North Belfast. CHRIS

• Those are gravy rings because they were fried, anything baked in an oven is a doughnut. Partial to both. LEANNE
 
• Apparently they’re called gravy rings at home because a super old fashioned term for cooking oil was gravy. GKAM
 
• When I was a child we called them gravy rings. Now I call them doughnuts. CAROL
 
• I was today years old when I discovered that some people on this planet call ring doughnuts ‘gravy rings’. The world’s gone mad. MRS F
 
• Gravy ring in Lurgan. CHARLENE
 
• In Dublin, they’re ring doughnuts. EDNA
 
• Gravy rings, lovely warm, sugary goodness when you get them freshly made. DEREK
 
• Gravy rings. Doughnuts have jam in the middle that always finds a way to launch on to whatever top your wearing at the time. DANNY

If you'd like to join the debate, or if you'd like to read more of the many contributions go to @squinteratn on Twitter.