Baking buzz

With the nights drawing in and the coronavirus news getting bleaker by the day there has never felt like a better time for the return of Bake Off. For the next ten weeks on a Tuesday evening, we can pull the curtains, pour a cup of tea, cut a slice of cake and collectively all get a little bit high on baking powder and icing sugar.

That may sound a little over the top but I have fond memories of attending the Cake & Bake Show in London a couple of years ago and I can genuinely say I don’t think I’ve ever been in the company of quite such a happy bunch of people. Whether it was the joy of being in an exhibition centre where everything was baking-themed or the mother of all sugar rushes, they were all smiling and loving the moment. It felt a bit like being at the baking equivalent of Glastonbury.

Its that baking buzz which sees me taking every opportunity to indulge, never happier than when I can decamp to the kitchen, choose my playlist and just shut the rest of the world out for a few hours. Yesterday was one of those days and the picture with this post shows the fruits of my labours.

First up was a loaf of bread baked with my new favourite flour. Until recently I hadn’t thought too much about the source of the flours I used. As long as I could get a regular supply I was happy. It was the shortages in the early days of lockdown which started to change things. Flour wasn’t on the store shelves and I had to hunt around to see if I could get it from anywhere else, that’s when I discovered Letheringsett Watermill They make flour in the traditional stone-ground way and source their grain from local farmers. I won’t deny the flour they produce is a little more expensive than what I have been buying, but the wonderful flavour of the bread it produces more than compensates. A case of getting what you pay for.

My second bake was a batch of bread rolls which have harissa, olives and feta mixed into a dough enriched with butter and eggs. The result is a light and fluffy bread with a lovely mix of salty tang and delicate heat in the aftertaste. I found the recipe in a column by Benjamin Ebuehi in the Guardian a few weeks back and this is the second batch I’ve made. One of the beauties of the recipe is that however good a combination harissa, olives and feta may be, it would probably work with a whole array of savoury options you might have available in your fridge.

After a couple of savoury bakes, I rounded off the day with chocolate and pear pudding. This is another Guardian recipe and comes from Felicity Cloake’s column where she looks at the various options for making a particular dish and comes up with the perfect version. This may look like a  simple recipe but I can assure that gently frying the pears in butter and brown sugar takes it into the realms of perfect.

The unfortunate downside of baking so much in one go is we won’t need anything for a couple of days now. The upside is I’m expecting tomorrow evenings Bake Off to give me lots of new ideas.