MESSY BAKER

My mother in law makes the best mince pies, they are these tiny buttery shells filled with juicy, boozy fruit always topped with a small pasty star. The pastry is wonderful and short, but it’s the mincemeat that really makes it.  I don’t think I will ever be able to replicate her recipe, so the best I can do it to go to good old favorites – Delia and Mary Berry and create my own recipe, my own special recipe that I can pass onto my children.  Christmas Mince  Makes 3x0.3l jars  200g (1 large) bramley apple  225g raising  225g currants  225g sultanas  130g mixed candied peel, chopped  225g brown sugar  50g toasted almond flakes  3 heaped tsp mixed spice  ½ tsp nutmeg  1 lemon, juice only  1 orange, juice only  150g shredded suet  50g butter  2 bay leaves  250ml brandy  Core the apple (don’t worry about peeling) and chop into small, fingernail size pieces. Place the appl...

Did you know its only 38 days before Christmas? Its definitely beginning to feel colder and wintery and we might even get snow this Christmas! To be fair, I am hoping for snow every year, and so far I have only seen a white Christmas once in all my years of living in London.  I love Christmas, I really do, and I love all the traditions and foods that come with it, and no Christmas is complete in our house without a Christmas cake. Now, this is a rather new tradition in our house, I’ve only been making a Christmas cake for the last five years or so. I am not a big fan Christmas cakes (or any fruit cake to be honest) that you buy in the shops. They are too sweet, too sticky, too artificial for my taste, I can taste the sugar grains and preservatives on my teeth. Which is why I decided to try making Christmas cakes at the first place – to see if the real deal is going to be any better, or maybe I am just not a Christmas cake person.  Well, turns out I am a Christmas cake ...

Its that time of the year when we start making up plans for the future and write down New Year resolutions. I am pretty bad with sticking to any resolutions, and in fact I’ve given up even making any for a number of years. This year I’ve decided to share my New Year resolution with all you lovely people, so if I start straying from the path you can yank me back on the straight and narrow. So, the plan is to bake a new bread every month – something traditional – from as many countries as possible, something familiar and a bit unusual at the same time, something I haven’t baked before.< Here is the plan, but I reserve the right to change it as I please :) Please, join me in my baking – I would love to see your photos January - English Cottage Bread . This is a good old traditional recipe, and I really like the fun shape of it. A nice and easy recipe to start the year. February - Pain de Campagne . Again, a very traditional French bread – I’ve read a recipe for that pain de ch...

I have been thinking about making fougasse for a long-long time, at least a couple of years, ever since I saw Richard Bertinet’ “Dough” book - I just knew I HAD to make it!! I don’t actually own the book, but I have rented it from a library so many times that I am sure that they think I own it :) Seriously, photos in the book are just amazing, and recipes… well, what can I say about recipes – as far as I am concerned Richard is an absolute Bread God!! I am an absolute convert after watching his mixing and kneading video – and I am telling you its either some higher magic or some sort of voodoo! His technique of turning what seems like a mess of flour and water into a smooth ball of dough is nothing short of a miracle. So as you are guessing I am a fan, a FUGE fan of Richard and his recipes, and I finally decided to give fougasse a go. I looked up a recipe online , and normally I wouldn’t mess with Richard’s recipe, but I was a bit tired and a bit short of time, so I decided to ...

I have been a bit quite of late, due to a number of things, but mainly down to two small babies to run after and a lot of DIY work at home. I am blaming DIY for the murder of my starter – the number of times I have forgot to refresh it cause I fell asleep from physical exhaustion! Warm weather and a tired baker does not bode well, I tell you that! I still have some mother starter in the fridge, so not all is lost. However I decided to take a break from sourdough breads an started looking to a quick and easy every day loaf recipe that I can do in a couple of hours in-between looking after babies and house work. I came across “ John Whaite Bakes at Home ” book and I found loaf perfection!!   John is the winner of The Great British Bake Off a couple of years back and I have been following him and his recipes for a while. I was super happy when Mr Ranty bought me John’s book as a present – its a beautiful book to look at, nice layout and tempting photos, also John’s writing style i...

One would think that a new house bigger house would also mean more space, more space for cookbooks. Apparently it means more space to unpack all the boxes we had sitting in storage for years and years. And unsurprisingly most of these boxes contain cookbooks that Mr Ranty and I have collected over the last decade or so. Our cook books are very much split into “his” and “hers”, with not much cross over in the middle : - anything to do with spice (Thai, Mexican, Georgian), anything weird (Molecular and Methodical) or Kiwi is in “his” pile - anything to do with bread and preserving is in “hers” pile And to be honest, Mr Ranty has been experiencing with some spicy and odd combinations preserves, so that is slowly migrating into “his” pile, and all I have left is bread - which suits me just fine.   So, I am going to do a review of some/all books I have, starting from easy, beginner style books to more advanced sourdough books, with some cakes and cupcakes thrown in fo...

A whole week of not baking, I am itching to get back to the kitchen now. Went to Moscow for a quick holiday, believe it or not, it was super hot, 30C every day and so humid!! Cold ice-cream for me and cold beer for Mr Ranty every day – the only way to deal with it. I put my starter to sleep in the fridge while I was away, took it out on Monday and started feeding it 30g water and 30g rye flour every morning and evening. It was looking reasonably active this morning, so might try baking tonight, that is if this cold London weather doesn’t kill it. While I am waiting for my starter to come alive, I’ve decided to make a cake out of the " Hummingbird Bakery " book again. A recipe I’ve tried out and tweaked a number of times, a favourite in my household. Mr Ranty is a big fan on lemon, and this particular lemon cake always doesn’t down really well. Super-Lemon Cake Adapted from “Hummingbird Bakery” cookbook Cake 3 eggs 260 g sugar zest of 2 lemons 400 g flour 1 ½ tsp baking powder...

After experimenting with a few recipes and making things up, I’ve decided to stick to a recipe and see how I get on. This time I went for Nancy Silverton’s Brioche bread, from her La Brea Bakery book. I’ve tried this recipe about six months ago, and got one of the best praises ever – “its just like what I buy in Paris”, from a guy who only just got back from France – you can’t get better than that, can you? I don’t think I can publish the actual recipe, cause I think that might be breaching book’s copyright, but I can tell you about the experience and get a chance to show off all the lovely photos :) The recipe uses starter as well as yeast, and I am thinking about testing out again soon, but without the yeast, then I will post the actual recipe, as it won’t be Nancy’s exact recipe any more, but my version of it – I think that would work. So, it’s classified as a three day bread, but don’t let it scare you, the actual hands on effort is very minimal, and you can easily fit it into your...

I am having a very "special" day - poured a cup of coffee twice over myself - twice!!! Grrr, managed to get it all over my desk and keyboard at work and all over myself, cleaned it up, cleaned myself up, dried everything, came back and did it again all over. Definitely a special day, once of those that you just want to pack everything up and go home. On a more positive note, I've started feeding my starter last night, converting a first white starter (50% hydration) into a liquid rye one (100% hydration). I've started feeding it 30 g water / 30 g light rye flour every morning and every evening. I received a request for a 100% rye bread, and am thinking of trying out one of the recipes from Andrew Whitley " Bread Matters " book. I've had that book for a few years now and still yet to make a single bread out of it. For some reason I find that book quite scary - there is a lot of explanation of different ingredients, and I tend to skip through them a lot. M...