First, to establish a bread connect since this is supposed to be a baking blog. Had a friend round for dinner last night. Sue’s starter was a parsnip & cider soup (only half the bottle came my way). This put me in mind of the Nordic Bakery Cookbook that I bought at least six months ago – wasn’t there something involving parsnips in that? Yes indeed – parsnip and sesame flatbreads, an interesting soda bread concoction. Thought I’d better bake some to go with the soup and to justify having bought yet another cookbook.
You will, of course, remember my post from August 2011 when we discovered the image of the BVM (Bethesda Virgin Mary) in a slice of Normandy Rye Cider (that’s it! the connection is cider!) well the parsnip soup was finished with a sprinkling of chopped apple fried in butter. Been a dreadful year for apples and Sue had managed to rescue a final one from the tree. When I came to peel and chop it, I couldn’t believe my eyes:
the face of the BVM has returned! Some say that you have to a true believer to see the image clearly and it does look a little like the Bethesda Virgin Muppet but you can’t deny the face is there.
Anyway I peeled, chopped and fried it and we scoffed it with the soup and the Nordic buns.
The PArtisan Baker 
It’s obviously the cider as does it…