MESSY BAKER

This is not strictly a bread recipe, but I was so pleased with the result, I decided to write it down for the future.  Last weekend we hosted a Russian-themed party, and what a better way to start a party than with a plate of blini and caviar!  Whenever we have a Russian party - which is once in a blue moon – I get caviar from Caspian Caviar guys – great quality and really speedy delivery. If you are strapped for time, you can get blini from them as well, but they will never be as good as the ones you make yourself.  Russian Blini  Makes 30-35  100 g plain flour  70 g spelt wholemeal flour (mine is from Shipton Mill )  250 ml warm milk  ¼ tsp sugar  ¼ tsp salt  1 tsp dry yeast  2 eggs, separated  Serve with:  Crème fraise  Caviar (black or red) or smoked salmon or cooked prawns  Chive (for decoration)  Now, traditional blini use buckwheat flour, but I didn’t have any in the house – who...

Happy St Patrick’s Day troops! This year I started preparing for it early : green top bought – check, a massive collection of whiskeys at home – check, make a beer bread – check!  In reality, I was just looking for new flavours to add to my bread, and found a bottle of pale ale left over from a Viking party last summer – that a story for another day.  I like my beers, but I am more of a larger girl, I’d drink Guinness too, but only in Ireland – it just doesn’t taste the same anywhere else. Ale is not a drink I would ever choose, so using it in bread made perfect sense!  Pale Ale Sourdough  220 ml pale ale  100 ml water  160g white sourdough starter (100% hydration)  1 Tbsp barley malt extract  400g white bread flour  100g wholemeal four  1.5 tsp salt  I used pale ale, but you can use any beer you may have in the house, as long as its not dark beer.  Pour beer and water in a mixer bowl, measure out starter. I am...

I really need to get better at this – its past mid-May and I am only just posting April project. But – the good thing is that I just finished May bread, so next post shouldn’t be too far behind.  My planning was completely off this month – I decided to bake Colomba Pasquale – a traditional Easter cake – for Easter celebrations this year. But, what I forgot to do is to check my calendar - I celebrate both Catholic and Russian Orthodox Easters – both of them fell at the beginning of the month this year, plus I had booked a trip to Russia with my little ones at the beginning of the month, so there was no way on earth I was going to finish my baking on time.  Anyway, I got there at the end, and to make up for the lateness, I’ve made five (yes, five) loaves just to test out different recipes and shapes. I tried using very traditional as well as more available ingredients, tall and round panettone cases and shallow and wide “dove” cases, and I finally came up with something I a...

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...

Its November, the autumn has well and truly settled in and in case you have missed it, its Halloween season!! I swear, the shops have started selling Halloween tat back in July, but now I can give in an buy as much cra.. I mean decoration as I feel like. Plus Mr Ranty just informed me that he has ordered a smoke machine, strobe lights and horror sounds – so you can see, it’s a family event in our household Plus, Ms Rantlet is two now and is much more interested in the holidays, so I am really looking forward to introducing her to Halloween and might even have to dress her up in a silly costume or two :)   Anyway, where was I? Right, Halloween, autumn … I love autumn, I love American word for it – “fall” – because that it exactly what it feels like. The leaves are turning copper colour, the days are getting shorter, but still mild with a ray of sunshine or two. And the best thing about autumn is pumpkins – not the huge orange decorative things they sell all over the place (al...

For the last three years I have been using a FreshLoaf recipe for Hot Cross buns (lost the actual recipe now) – my very first year attempt was quite successful, but lately I was getting a bit disappointed with the recipe, the buns were coming out small and quite dense. So, I thought its time to try a new recipe and decided to start trying out recipes well in advance of Easter. Hot Cross bun is basically a sweet dough with a lot of fruit and spices, and when you are after a sweet dough, you can’t go wrong with The King of sweet dough – Richard Bertinet. I found his recipe for Hot Cross buns online and it looked like a good place to start. You know me, I can’t live a recipe alone, gotta mess with it a bit, otherwise my name wouldn’t be Messy Baker J Hot Cross Buns Makes 13 250ml milk, warmed up 1 egg 50ml whiskey 1 pack of instant dried yeast 2 Tbsp (heaped) caster sugar 1 tsp vanilla extract 80g unsalted butter, melted 370g white flour 130g whole-wheat flour 1 ...