Making Rye

Never really understood why people are so wary about baking rye or why there’s such a mystique attached to the process. A basic 100% wholemeal rye is so simple to make. The mystique increases when it comes to rye starters which should be ancient and shrouded in secrecy. For over 20 years I nourished a […]

St Valentine’s 2024

Thought this one was pretty good – 1K Brioche de Provence, the fruit soaked in a good whack of Navy rum. BUT … you know I’m always raving about Bethesda’s food hero Carrie Rimes – not just a BBC Food Producer of the Year, but THE BBC Food Producer of the Year, producing fabulous cheese […]

Coppice Blend

Couple of weeks past, Rick and Maggie bore gifts up from darkest South Wales: about a kilo each of TyT, Torth y Tir – grain from a group of South Wales farmers – Felin Ganol milled Maris Wigeon – and milled Coppice Blend. Coppice Blend is very interesting because it is grain that has been […]

Real Bread Campaign?

A couple of weeks back The Real Bread Campaign advertised a baking event in London with a list of the speakers taking part. They posted this on the Micro Bakery Connection Facebook Group. Never having hidden my low opinion of the Campaign I replied “Funny, my name doesn’t seem to appear on the speakers […]

Epiphany 2024

5th January, 12th Night. Down come the decorations and into the oven with Rosca de Reyes (Three Kings Bread) ready for Epiphany today. Formula here.

Four Baguettes

Well, four baguettes was the intention. Mixed the dough yesterday morning for 4 x 200g bags. Should have shaped and proved about 2.00 p.m. and baked about 5.30 p.m. which was about the time I thought maybe it should be put into an induced coma in the fridge because Life had intervened. 440g is the […]

Bara Blas

A unique present for the (Welsh speaking) baker in your life Back in 2010 I wrote one of the first exclusively sourdough baking books in the UK. Two years later I had it translated into Welsh as Bara Blas and to date, as far as I can ascertain, it is still the only Welsh language […]

Porky Pizza

Sunday Lunch – who needs it? (Well, the roast beef and Yorkshire pudding variety). Yesterday Sue did a fabulous pork joint, slow roast with orange and cumin from Moro Easy. Today I took advantage of the considerable remains to do a deep pan pizza of Peter Reinhart, Philly-style Roast Pork with Broccoli (except I substituted […]

Gift Vouchers

Doreen Duvall, on the Microbakery Connection page, asked about Bakery gift cards. I’m sure this will be no help whatsoever but it reminded me of a situation I once faced. A few years back when I was baking for sale I ran individual two-day courses for people who wanted to learn sourdough. Particularly in the […]

Bordeaux Chapelure

“Chapelure” means breadcrumbs. My French is a sad collection of words without any connecting grammar often arising from situations we have found ourselves in. Like “fuite” – leak, “ne marche pas” – doesn’t work, “epingle de suritee” – safety pin. Chapelure is one that comes from struggling through French cookery books. There are ALWAYS cars […]