Big Heart

Valentine’s 2023 Brioche Card Sparkle in the fridge …

On the Beet

I know I’m going on about this, but as well as tasting so good, this bread is stunning to look at. Can you imagine not being impressed with your own bread? What would be the point of continuing to bake? How could you offer it to other people (for sale or as a gift), not […]

Beet This

Beetbrot – yes, I know we’ve been here several times before but this one is particularly spectacular. I have a very useful little trade with Carrie, Bethesda’s star cheese maker (Cosyn Cymru). She supplies me with cheese and yoghurt that she thinks are not quite saleable and I supply her with the odd loaf of […]

Pork Enchiladas

Rate my plate. Sunday lunch. Pork Enchiladas, Guacamole, Rice, Frijoles Refritos, Quick Pickled Onions. Even though the pork was left over from another meal and the beans had already been cooked, there’s a lot of work here. At 10.00 a.m. I was well into prepping. The phone rang and I ignored it. Getting on for […]

Bored With Boules?

Just fancied a change. Not sure what you would call it – 800g Big Baguette? Big Bâtard? (known a few of them …). Whatever it is it’s a bit of a mongrel – Pain de Campagne formula but using Shiptons bread flour with 15% Gilchesters bran. So the 502g in the formula becomes 427g bread […]

Santes Dwynwen 2023

Click for formula This year I gave the apricots a serious overnight soaking in mead. This and the amount of olive oil in the formula made the loaves feel very heavy. But, despite my fears, the cut slices were really (too) easy to eat. Could have served them with custard …

Paella

What else can you do on a wet Sunday afternnon?

Breakfast # 37

This year’s Rosca de Reyes, Epiphany bread. In Jesus’ time there were three wise kings unlike the male members of our own dear royal family. Formula here if you missed it last time. Senility is setting in. I poured the melted butter into the milk and then realised I’d read the flour weight for the […]

Rear View

As a matter of principle I only ever take photographs from the front doorstep – with the flexibility of maybe a couple of meters either side. When you have a view like this, the light shifting all the time, what else would you do? But today I did something radical: a highly technical shot that […]

New Grain

Major step forward on the milling front. About five years ago I bought a 25K sack of wheat grain from Doves and I finally milled the last of it. Amazing how well it keeps. But now I’m finally getting a little more organised/disciplined. It only takes about 8 minutes to mill a kilo of grain. […]