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Butter – We Have Great Butter

January 14, 2012
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When I refer to we, I’m talking United Kingdom and Ireland.  These Isles with gloomy dark winters and wet summers may not be beach holiday destinations but they are great for pasturelands with grazing cows…there is a benefit for putting up with lousy weather; great dairy.  If you have only lived in these parts you […]

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Low Protein Flours Make Great Bread, It’s All About the Flour

November 24, 2011
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Anne Parry owner of Felin Ganol watermill told me about this stoneground white flour she had, a single variety called Amaretto that was low in protein 10.5%.  This flour is being sold as an All Purpose flour but she thought it had a great flavour.  I couldn’t wait to try it.  I did and love […]

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Tarka,Tadka, Chaunk, Dhungar: Tempering Spices & Making Dal

November 15, 2011
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I’ve recently made 2 posts on spices and now would like to mention one of my favourite ways of spicing lentils; tarka.  Tarka, tadka or chaunk and also known by other names if you look on wiki here, is a very good way of spicing food, not just legumes. I first noticed it years ago […]

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Don’t Dry Roast Spices

November 8, 2011
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Want to be controversial in the foodie world here, tell them not to dry roast spices before making a masala mix.  If I hear or read one more chef, cookery writer stating, “you should dry roast spices for masala because it enhances them, giving a better flavour..”  I might just scream…quietly inside. It was a year […]

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Sourdough Problems from My Beginnings

October 10, 2011
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The 5th April 2010 is the most significant date in my sourdough life.  That’s it above, my very first loaf, using a starter  GillthePainter  put in the post to me.  I followed her advice of baking it in a pot, I used an inexpensive cast iron pot of mine,  and produced a loaf.  Ok it’s […]

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Dan Lepard Workshop at the Cookery School, London

September 28, 2011
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Last Saturday I attended Dan Lepard’s workshop on sourdough, held in the centrally located kitchen of the Cookery School in London.  It’s one of my favourite areas of London not because I know it so well having worked around there for years in a previous life but because it’s a stone’s throw away from John […]

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Life Cycle of a Sourdough Starter Part II

September 23, 2011
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This post is the half to the rather detailed one I wrote on how to maintaing and control a healthy starter and balance its acidity, Cycle of Sourdough Starter Part I. Here I wanted to show from the beginning of making my own starter back in November 2010 using Dan’s recipe, a very easy one to […]

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Life Cycle of a Sourdough Starter Part I

September 23, 2011
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This post is the all wordy stuff I have found on sourdough starter and it’s suppose to sit alongside my step-by-step photo post of the  Life Cycle of a Sourdough Starter Part II, go ahead and check it out. I use the term, starter/levain/leaven/motherdough interchangeably.  In the Advance Bread & Pastry book it explains the […]

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Preserving with Gloria Nicol

September 4, 2011
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I bought Gloria’s new preserving book, 100 Jams Jellies Preserves & Pickles back at the beginning of July but because I’ve been immersed with all things bread I haven’t had the chance to mention it here but now I must.  I’ve spent a few days boiling down some of my favourite summer fruits using her […]

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Walnut & Raisin Bread

July 1, 2011
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I can not stress enough or even beg you to throw away your nuts if they’ve been kept a long time.  Before they go rancid they go stale and though you can still eat stale nuts don’t use them in a lovely loaf like this, find another use for them.  It struck a cord with […]

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Gregoire’s Light Scones

June 17, 2011
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I’m grateful for bumping into Gregoire through twitter because not only do I have great banter with him, he’s an incredibly generous person with his advice and to top it all he has wonderful recipes like this one, beautifully light scones.  It’s not too sweet, the perfect receptor for cream and jam or the luxurious […]

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Tortilla Espanola – Spanish Omelette

May 12, 2011
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I absolutely love tortilla Española.  It’s important I make it clear how much I love it because it will explain how pedantic I am about it and how it’s made.  The other person in my family who’s also very found of it is my mother.  Both my mother and I have had appalling versions of […]

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Potato Dauphinoise

February 13, 2011
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By nature I’m a lazy cook, meaning I’ll short-cut a method wherever I can…only have to look at my no-knead bread efforts to get that but here I do the opposite, I’ll add an extra step.  I see lots of recipes for potato dauphinoise where the potato is layered in the serving dish and the […]

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Ice Cream or Sorbet Too Firm in the Freezer?

January 3, 2011
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I’ve been working on this through the holidays, reading up on the problem of homemade ice cream or sorbet becoming rock hard in the freezer.  I don’t know what you were doing the day after Christmas but I had the afternoon off and spent it enthusiastically reading up on ice-cream and corn syrup, researching information […]

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Easy Chocolate Truffles

December 3, 2010
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For the little effort of boiling some cream adding chopped chocolate, stir until melted and refrigerate you can make chocolates.  It doesn’t get more complicated than that.  Once your chocolate is set just scoop it out using a teaspoon and roll them in cocoa powder.  It’s incredibly impressive to serve chocolates you’ve made.  Make these […]

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