This weekend Sue and I are celebrating 48 years of living together – Sunday 13th October is the day but, no need to be that specific, it’s Friday and we’re starting now with a little prepping … The bread was made yesterday already. Pain Niçoise packed with olives, sundried tomatoes, garlic, figs, herbs, and, a […]

Last week we were down in Bath, which is Sue’s home town, for the first time since before Covid. Everything has changed on the restaurant front but she’d done some research and had a little list of possibilities one of which was The Oven, a wood-fired pizza place. Normally I avoid pizza joints like the […]

Had a couple of days in Bath, Sue’s home town, for the first time since Covid. Wandered round taking in the changes – complete new set of restaurants. Took the opportunity to do the bookshops and, of course, I head for the cookery section. No bread shelf in Waterstones but two pizza books. Pull out […]

Don’t know where this formula came from. Been in my spreadsheets for years so I must have made it before. Had a surplus of buttermilk after making cornbread and found it by the simple expedient of doing a search for “buttermilk” in Excel. It’s not a true wholemeal – 25% bread flour – and the […]

Last week Chris Young (Mr Real Bread Campaign) posted his annual Sourdough September announcement on the Microbakery forum. Not sure what he would have done if there wasn’t a month beginning with “S” but he has been proudly and loudy proclaiming it for about the last ten years as if it was a great achievement. […]

The 80% hydration dough in the Bread Formulas section of this site is probably the most viewed of the bread recipes. I’m never sure why because generally my formulas have unfashionably low hydration levels and it’s not even a genuine 80%, a mere 78 point something. Thought everyone else was doing 90-100%+. Never mind. Its […]

You could laugh at this bread. You could call it a bit gimmicky. Pink bread to attract the crowds. But my version, with raw and cooked beetroot and a good smack of cheddar, is serious bread as well as being photogenic (and jokey). I don’t even bake it that often, but when I did a […]

A few posts back (Halot,etc) I told you about finding the bread book of Babka Zana, the Parisian jewish bakery, when we were in Bordeaux back in May. Since then I’ve been working on their savoury breads. So we start off with Hallah of which they have three variations, La Hallah or Pain de Shabbat, […]

This all started on Saturday (it’s now Thursday). Sue cooked a 1.5K joint of pork from Moro Easy – the meat marinated overnight in orange juice and cumin and then braised slowly in the oven for about 3 hours. Very delicious. On Sunday, with some of the remains, I cooked Arroz com Porco (or at […]

Funny the places baking can take you. You might have seen that I am currently exploring Babka Zana, the book of the Parisian Jewish bakery of the same name. The owners, Sarah Amouyal and Emmanuel Murat, have a modern approach to Jewish food traditions of the Mediterranean particularly North Africa and Israel. So, in addition […]