inner pickle

winter garden

We're incredibly lucky with such a mild climate that we can keep growing things alive and harvesting around here throughout winter and without cold frames or greenhouses.

(Although a greenhouse is on my 'Adam to do' list which he just found about about last week. "What to do list?" he asked. "Your list," I said. "What list??" he asked. "The one in my notebook." "Oh right," he said, "a to do list you've written for me. Maybe you should give that to me sometime."

It's quite long. I was picking my moment.)

 

 

 

Anyway, we've got stuff growing. We're eating pumpkins and turnips and rocket and waiting for broadbeans and beets and peas. 

And I made soda bread for the first time today! What a revelation! It was 12pm and visitors were coming for lunch at 12.30 and obviously there was no time for an ordinary yeasted loaf. I grabbed The River Cottage Bread book to get their flatbread recipe and saw their soda bread recipe which took 30 mins total prep and bake time. No exaggeration.  

 

I added golden syrup to the recipe and used half wholemeal flour and we're smitten. Lovely for lunch with wintery gardeny stuff.

 

I was interested that it used baking powder and not bicarb soda (although of course that's a main ingredient in baking powder) but I'd like to try it again with bicarb instead. I used raw jersey milk too, and would try buttermilk (as they suggest) next time. 

I'll make it again and blog it after. (The recipe I used today is down in the house through two locked doors and a cold dark run across the paving, it'll have to wait!)

Are you a soda bread fan? Do you have a favourite recipe?

Those Irish, they were onto something... Dark beer and soda bread together, that'd have to be a winning combination. Dark beer, soda bread and a rich beef stew? Heaven on a table?

xxx

sourdough loving

 

I've had a mixed relationship with sourdough. It started well, with a from-scratch starter and passable loaves. For a while it completely replaced yeasted bread around here. 

Then I moved to the farm and neglected my starter and it all went pear shaped. The chooks ate a lot of heavy-as-lead sourdough. A lot. My friend Heidi gave me some of her starter which was legendarily from the same mother as the one used by Berry Sourdough. I made one good loaf. The next wasn't so good and by the time the starter had lived with me for a fortnight only the chickens were eating the bread. 

Finally I chucked it in, much to the chooks relief, until last weekend I nicked some starter from my friends Greg and Jan. Thankfully I had given them some of my orginal starter when I first embarked on the adventure, and they did a much better job with it than me. The gift that keeps giving. Thanks you guys!

I made an average loaf yesterday. It's on the bench and someone made some toast with it. 

But today I think I got it right. It's not perfect but it's not chook food. We can work on that open hole structure, as long as I can keep the damn starter alive. 

 

Yesterday I used the River Cottage Bread cookbook recipe, the one I had persisted and persisted with unsuccessfully. I adjusted it a bit today. I won't be so bold as to blog it yet, let's get it right twice first. 

 

I'd forgotten how much I like it. Chewy and tasty. Great with chicken soup and lashings of butter for dinner. Back on the horse. Hooray. 

 

Happy Wednesday lovely folk.

xxx

Thank you, Rooster.

 

Day 18 and if I ever pretend I got to Day 19 on my own ingenuity, feel free to snort. Our friends Mark and Amy are responsible for us not chucking it in today. Friends that grow stuff. Who sent us home with enormous, crisp, juicy watermelons and delicious pumpkins. A bag of fresh salad makings and tamarillos and strawberry guavas. 

And roosters! The deal was if we helped process four excess roosters, we could keep two. I've always wanted to learn - because our meat chickens are sold commercially, I have to take them up to a local abattoir. I'd never killed a chicken before, or even plucked one. 

It was a good day to learn! 

 

 

Mark has done this a few times before but still we referred to the master of chicken evisceration, Joel Salatin (specifically, Pastured Poultry Profits.) What we must have looked like, Mark at the killing cone, Adam on the knives, me calling out the step by steps according to Joel. It felt like the first one took an hour and then next three about five minutes each. 

I love learning new things. Even if it's how to detatch a bird's windpipe (my least favourite bit.) It was done respectfully and quickly and was mechanically pretty efficient, once we got going. 

We used a heated urn as a dunker, and the plucking was pretty quick. 

Thank you, rooster, for feeding us (tomorrow.)

Another reason to celebrate today was I made my first batch of sourdough with my new starter. 

If you've been around here for a while you'll know I got into sourdough last year. Except I killed my starter a couple of times, and then finally gave up and tossed it out. 

When I started this challenge without much yeast left in the jar, I immediately put together a new starter and got it going. Goes like this: 1 big tablespoon of flour and mix with filtered water to a sloppy paste. Next day, toss out half and "feed" again, flour + water. Keep paste consistency. Do this for about 5 or 6 days, tossing out and building up until it's actively bubbling and smells yeasty and frankly looks like a living thing. I'll photograph mine tomorrow to give you the idea. 

I then followed Hugh Fearnly-Whittingstall's sourdough recipe and kabam! What a loaf!

Chewy, crusty, flavoursome. 

And almost only flour and water. THAT is magic.

 

My next big question is: how do I make chicken soup without any onions or carrots?! Hmmm.

Ever killed your own food?

There is something weirdly deeply wholesome about it. (With apologies to vegetarian friends.)

xxx

 

the sourdough-eating baby

*Grin*

Hope you all have a lovely weekend. 

xxx

 

how do you make sourdough?

I'm not going to pretend I'm some legend baker of perfect sourdough, let's get that straight.

I'm new to sourdough. Ordinary bread: yes, I think the sheer numbers of loaves I've started, risen, punched, risen, baked, (eaten), I get to claim that I know something about that. 

But sourdough is cool. SO cool. 

You make a paste of flour and water (starter recipe here) and after a few days the wild yeast has arrived at the party, you add some flour, water and a bit of salt and you have a risen loaf of bread. No yeast. No oil or butter. No milk powder.

Now that's some honest bread. 

 

 

We've been experimenting with free form over loaves baked in tins. I'm fantasizing about getting a proofing basket or two to create a proper sourdough shape.

 

 

And over in the corner is Henry Bean running a private and enthusiastic demonstration of how to bake sourdough. 

 

 

"And then you eat it!"

No you don't dude. I haven't finished with the photos. Put the bread down. 

Here's the recipe I used, Arabella Forge's instructions from Frugavore.

 

SOURDOUGH

*note: takes approx 24 hrs rising time. 

Ingredients:

1 cup sourdough starter

8 cups flour (I've only ever used 7)

filtered water

sea salt

 

Method:

Mix the starter with 3 cups of the flour and just enough filtered water to form a smooth paste like the consistency of the starter (about 1.5 cups water max.)

Cover and leave at room temperature for 12 hours. The whole thing will bubble like a huge bowl of starter.

I do this bit in the morning and the next bit in the evening. (And bake the next morning.)

I know this sounds crazily involved but each step only take a few minutes and it's not like we're sitting around waiting for the bread, you know? It just does it's thing, we do our thing, we eventually bake it. But I digress.

So in the evening I add sea salt (a big dash) and 4 cups of flour to the bubbling mix. Mix well. Add water if too dry and more flour if you need it. 

Work into a round ball and knead for about 10 minutes. (In the spirit of full disclosure, I do not do this bit by hand anymore. I have a mixmaster with dough hooks. Which I'm very grateful for!)

The dough should feel soft and springy and returns to form if poked. If it feel hard and unyielding it may not have been kneaded long enough or the starter may not have been sufficiently active. 

Place the ball in a tin or on a tray and leave it somewhere draft-free to double in size over about 12 hours. Arabella suggests leaving it in the (cold) oven and then turning the oven on the next morning to 180 degrees celcius and giving it an hour. If you put it into a hot oven it only needs 45 minutes. 

It's cooked when it sounds hollow when tapped, and leave it to cool for 10 mins before slicing. 

I loved Frugavore by the way, I highly recommend it. Without Arabella I might not have tried this. 

Hope this inspires you to have a go too.

Everyone needs some wild yeast in their lives.

xxx

P.S. I love this bread because it looks like ridiculous white cartoon bread. I used to call that super soft white bread 'balloon bread'. 'Cept it's not, it's rocking, flavoursome sourdough. Thank you, Arabella. 

 

make your own sourdough starter

Although it's kinda magic, there is no holy mystery to making sourdough, and seriously, anyone can do it. It's just flour and water. And if you're someone who will get a buzz from having wild yeast fermenting on your benchtop, then I seriously recommend it. 

I initially followed Arabella Forge's recipe from Frugavore  but unfortunately my starter was dead before it started. I didn't even know what live starter looked like, I just knew there was nothing happening here. 

Arabella recommends using organic rye flour, but I think that may have been my problem. I switched to unbleached plain and we were on our way. Arabella also had a slightly complicated way in which to build up the starter. Instead, on round two, I just fed it every day: a quarter cup of flour and a quarter cup filtered water.

 

(starter day 1)

Here's what I did.

SOURDOUGH STARTER

1. In a bowl or container, mix well a quarter cup unbleached plain flour with quarter cup filtered water.

2. The following day, add another quarter cup unbleached plain flour and quarter cup filtered water and give a good stir. Occasional bubbles should be forming on the surface.

3. For at least the next three days repeat step 2. 

4. By about day six you should have very good bubble action and your starter should be ready to use. It will depend a bit on the flour you're using and the humidity or otherwise of your kitchen.

5. To keep your sourdough starter active, just keep feeding it flour and water every day. You can store it in the fridge and it will go into 'hibernation' mode. It will stay alive if you feed it once a week, but you'll need to leave it out of the fridge and feed it on the bench for a couple days before baking with it again.

6. Some recipes call for only ever using wooden spoons to mix - no metal. I used metal and it was fine. 

7. Everyone seems to agree you need filtered water. This was straightforward for me as we're on tank water and only drink out of a filter jug anyway. I think some of the chemicals in town water (fluoride etc) might mess with the starter chemistry.

 

(starter day 2)

 

(starter day 3)

 

(starter day 4)

 

(starter day 5)

My starter by day five had started to smell like acetone. As in, nail polish remover. I looked it up and thoughts seemed to be to just keep feeding it, which I did (and started another starter at the same time.) The acetone smell got stronger but the bread itself kept rising every day and tasted beautiful. 

I contacted Arabella (I was using her bread recipe, it's great, more on that shortly) and she gave me this fantastic answer:

"If it smells like acetone it has most likely over-fermented and the wild yeast has turned to alcohol. It is not beyond help. I would remove 3/4 of the starter and with the remainder feed it to twice its bulk with flour and water. Sourdough starters can turn alcoholic if they are not fed enough - rather than eating, they continue to ferment and become alcoholic. If you are not going to feed it and use it much, make sure you keep it in a cool place to slow down activity. I hope that helps."

Right-o then! I had already thrown out the first starter and was using my second (hence the two different bowls in the photos), which had also started to smell like acetone. For a soft flour like the one I was using, I suspect a quarter of a cup is not enough, particularly in a warm kitchen where the oven's usually on. I followed Arabella's instructions and the starter now looks like a beefed-up day 4. And smells wonderful.

I've also switched flours to a coarser organic unbleached, and we'll see how it goes.

I'll get to the bread-making next. In which flour and water (and a shake of sea salt) make a fully risen loaf. 

 

Magic!

xxx

i think we might have nailed it

Can I tell you how much sourdough we've eaten this weekend? 

Probably too much. 

Also: tending to a slightly miserable babe tonight (sick again? first tooth?) so will post full sourdough story tomorrow, with apologies for the wait.

Hold on for the awesomeness of sourdough. Flour, water, a little salt. It's like magic.

xxx

this could be the start of something big

Five days ago I started a sourdough starter, first time. 

 

I followed Arabella Forge's recipe from her book Frugavore, and used organic rye flour. 

I fed it regularly, made sure it was a comfortable temperature and checked up on it frequently. 

 

On day five though, Arabella claimed I should be seeing some good bubble action. 

Not really.

So I fled to the old trusty youtube and checked out some video of sourdough starters. Mine did not look particularly alive. Oh dear. Failure to thrive. I'm sure it's not Arabella's fault. Poor, dead sourdough starter.

 

 

So I chucked it and started again. 

With white bakers flour (all purpose.)

And after less than 24 hours it's already alive. Bubbly, stretchy, kinda weird. And smells good!

Cheering!

Will report back after day five, hopefully this time with a loaf!

Ever made sourdough? Any tips?

xxx

PS Hey I was chuffed to be invited to be May's featured blogger over at Nuffnang! Check it out! 

two a penny

Oh, Easter.

You can keep your chocolate eggs, your bunnies and your bilbies, all I need is a hot cross bun. 

Ideally warmed (not toasted), with a lick of proper butter. 

 

 

For someone who makes a lot of bread, and buns, and any number of bakery items I just cannot get through the day without, it was weird it'd never occurred to me to make my own hot cross buns.  

I was kinda busy over Easter what with the odd hospital visit and being away, so I made these for the first time this weekend. 

And they're dead quick and easy. 

Just like a bought one. 

 

 

I used this recipe, but increased the spice and next time would add a bit more. Also I think they could use a touch more sugar. It is a sweet bun, right? 

And now, I think we might now be officially hot cross bunned out. 

(Until I make these - without crosses -  in a couple of months time, hello current buns!)

So did you make buns this year? 

And more importantly, are all the easter eggs really gone?!

 

xxx

recipe for flat bread

 

I had a good flatbread recipe, briefly. My sister Naomi emailed it, I made it, it rocked, lost the recipe. Goneski. 

While procrastinating asking for the recipe again, I started making this one. 

It's a cobbled together recipe from about three sources, I think it's close to Naomi's 'cept hers uses wholewheat flour. And I can't remember about the yeast.

This one works well served with soup (we've found), or toasted with dips, or topped with fresh tomato or tomato sauce and melted cheese for a pizza-like dinner which actually got a cheer from the smallies. A cheer. I'd go a long way for a cheer from the diners. 

 

Flatbread

Ingredients:

2 teaspoons (instant) yeast

1 tsp sugar

half cup warm water

3 cups flour

1 tsp salt

1 cup tepid water

 

Method:

Stir the sugar into the warm water until it dissolves then sprinkle the yeast and leave (5 mins or so) till it bubbles. 

Then add this to a big bowl containing the flour and salt. Mix well then add the tepid water.

Take out and knead on a floured board, keep adding flour until it's not too sticky to handle and is smooth and elastic. 

Sit it, covered, until it doubles (about an hour or so). Then break it up into 12 balls, knead each one a bit and leave them, covered, for another 10 minutes.

 

Roll out each ball as thin as you can (about 1cm) and put onto lined baking tray.

 

 

Bake on 230 degrees C for 5 mins or until puffed up, turn over and bake about 3 mins second side. 

If you want a pita-like pocket, leave at ball stage for longer before rolling out (thicker 'skin'). 

For a thinner wrap, press down firmly with a spatula after rising. 

 

Cover them immediately with a cloth as you make them to keep them soft. They store well in ziplock bags. 

Yummy with pesto and tomato.

I'm cheering that!

xxx