I must have gone off salad as, although there’s been loads of salady type stuff in the fridge, all last week I’ve ignored this and made myself cheese and coleslaw sandwiches instead. That’s not quite in keeping with the eat healthy lunches regime I usually have. So I decided to go back to the make a load of soup on Monday to last through the week thing. And today’s lunch was spiced carrot and lentil soup from the BBC Good Food website. I love that site.

I also loved the soup. Easy to make and whilst probably a bit hearty for a summer’s day (well, it would be if we had a flipping summer’s day), it was very filling.

Along with the soup, I decided to excel in today’s flurry of domestic goddessing and made some home made bread. Well, home made as in out of a packet mix and made in the bread maker. I used half the packet and 2 hours and 53 minutes later, out came the smallest loaf of bread in the world. Is it just me or does it look a bit like a curly dog poo?

Still, curly dog poo notwithstanding, the bread was quite dense and very filling but very nice, especially as I had it while it was still warm, fresh out of the bread maker.

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As I’ve recently rediscovered crumpets, I thought I’d have a go at making my own as, although they only cost 57p for 8 in Tesco, I don’t like the huge list of ingredients you get on packaged things and after scouring the internet for a crumpet recipe, found out I already had all the ingredients in the cupboard.  Result.  The only thing I didn’t have were rings to cook them in, which was easily resolved by a trip to the local hardware shop.  Although with two rings costing £4.25, I’m going to have to make a lot of crumpets to break even.

So, on with the making of crumpets.

First, I got stuck when I re-read the recipe and it said dried yeast.  Is that the same as fast action yeast?  I tried Twittering but got no reply so re-scoured the internet for another crumpet recipe using fast-action yeast but they all looked a bit of a faff, so I decided to risk it and use fast action yeast in the recipe I’d already found.

Ingredients (makes 6 – I halved the original recipe)

4 oz strong plain flour [the other recipes said plain flour so I got confused again but I used strong white flour, the type you use for making bread].

1/2 level teaspoon salt

1/2 level tablespoon dried yeast [I used fast action yeast]

1/2 teaspoon caster sugar

1/4 pint milk [I would have used soya milk to make them vegan but didn’t want to open a new litre carton just to use a tiny bit of it so used the moo juice that was in the fridge]

1 fl oz water

Equipment
Cooking rings [I bought the kind used for making poached eggs]
Frying pan

Preparation

Heat the milk and water together in a small saucepan till they are ‘hand hot’.  Then pour into a jug, stir in the sugar and dried yeast and leave it in a warm place for 10-15 minutes till there is a good frothy head on it [it’s November and therefore not very warm but it did go frothy].

Meanwhile, sift the flour and salt into a mixing bowl and make a well in the centre.  When the yeast mixture is frothy, pour it all into the mixing bowl.

Slowly work the flour into the liquid with a wooden spoon.  Beat well at the end to make a perfectly smooth batter.

Cover the mixing bowl with a tea-towel and leave to stand in a warm place for about 45 minutes – by which time the batter will have become light and frothy [once again, I had trouble finding somewhere warm and I don’t know about light and frothy, but it did change appearance].

When you’re ready to cook, grease the insides of the cooking rings very well and add a little oil to your frying pan before placing it over a medium heat.

When the pan is hot, arrange the rings in the frying pan and spoon 1 tablespoon of the batter into each ring [1 tablespoon is nowhere near enough.  I used about 3 or 4].

Let them cook for 4 or 5 minutes: first tiny bubbles will appear on the surface and then, suddenly, they will burst, leaving the traditional holes.

Now take a large spoon and fork, lift off the rings and turn the crumpets over.  Cook on the second side for about 1 minute only.  Re-grease and reheat the rings before cooking the next batch [I used a bit of tea-towel to lift the rings off, they slid off easily.  I didn’t re-grease the rings as the first two crumpets I cooked were quite greasy.  The crumpets were quite brown underneath; I don’t know if I cooked them for too long?]

I ate one as soon as it had been cooked and while the taste and texture were pretty much identical to shop-bought ones, they were a bit greasy and really not worth all that time, effort and mess to make, so Tesco will be pleased to know its profits won’t be dwindling by 57p a week after all.

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The Bread Book by Sara Lewis

Last night I’m trying to decide whether or not to make some bread and because I can’t think for myself, I put this pondering onto my Facebook status like the saddo I am and it gets the thumbs up from Julia and Mark and so then I have to decide what bread to make and in my fridge there’s some sundried tomatoes and some jalapenos and so I think aha, I will make sundried tomato and jalapeno bread and I adapt a recipe from The Bread Book: The Definitive Guide to Making Bread by Hand or Machine and hope for the best and in the morning I have a perfect loaf of gorgeous smelling bread and I tuck into it as fuelling for my long run.

Sundried tomato and jalapeno bread (makes 1 small loaf)

Ingredients:
325g strong white flour
1 tbsp olive oil
200 ml water
2tsp caster sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 3/4 tsp fast action dried yeast
35g sundried tomatoes (blot them if in oil) / chopped
30g jalapenos / chopped

How to do it:
Put the water and oil into the tin
Add the flour, sugar and salt
Make a dip in the flour and add the yeast
Add the sundried tomatoes and jalapenos (try to avoid putting them on the yeast)
Set it for small loaf, medium crust
Press start (or time it to be ready for when you get up)
Eat it while you’re emptying the dishwasher and making a cup of tea

Sundried tomato bread

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Waking up to the smell (do I have to use a poncy word like aroma?  No one ever says aroma.  “Ooh, what a nice aroma”?  As if) of freshly baked bread is one of the nicest things to wake up to (although waking up next to The Meat Eater has its advantages sometimes. Well, someone needs to make the tea, don’t they?) and so last night I set the bread machine (no, I’m not THAT much of a domestic goddess, I am a Lazy Domestic Goddess. Hmm, I feel a book coming on) to make me some cheddar, sun-dried tomato and olive bread in time for 8am, a recipe I adapted from The Bread Machine Book, which originally called for 50g of feta cheese but, being the rebel I am, I substituted that for roughly 100g of vintage cheddar. And yes, I know you’re not supposed to put perishables in the bread machine overnight, but read what I just said about being a rebel. A rebel without a stomach lining.

Cheddar, sun-dried tomato and olive bread

And I go for my run and come back and breakfast on my freshly made bread and hot chocolate and, bloody hell, that may possibly be the nicest bread I’ve ever made.

Ingredients (for 450g / 1lb loaf):
175ml (6 fl oz) water
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp salt
350g (12 oz) bread flour
1 1/2 tsp yeast
100g cheddar
25g chopped green olives
2 tbsp chopped sun-dried tomatoes

Instructions:
Put all ingredients in bread tin in order suggested by your bread machine instructions
Set for white bread, medium crust
Press start
Eat and say bloody hell, that may possibly be the nicest bread I’ve ever made

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