Baking Archives - Jenny May

Nothing but food

Mealtimes have become the main event rather than the punctuation. But here is a danger; the comfort or boredom snacking.

There is nothing to talk about but food. Oh, and – when is bins? I don’t know about you, but between the amount of time we have been in lockdown and the weather being so bad that even the allowed daily exercise has been put largely on hold, it feels that there is very little to say about what anyone has done each week. Living rurally, we were completely snowed in and so I didn’t even get to my blood or chemo appointments this week. They may not exactly be highlights but at least they mean I get to leave the house.

I love having catch ups with my closest ones on various on-line platforms but they, as well as phone calls can end up a little like this: “Anyone done anything this week?” “Not really.” “Pretty much the same as last week.” “Yep.” “Yep, me too.”

At least before the snow we were able to start talking about what was coming out in the garden and the things we were thinking of getting planted, but even that has been thwarted until things improve. The snow itself, did of course, provide a new topic of conversation for a while especially when wondering just who had left trails up and down our garden when I wasn’t looking – turns out, it was pheasants.

But it’s not as if there is nothing to do, it’s just that somehow, in our long confinements, everything just feels a bit samey. If it weren’t for all my hospital appointments the calendar would be redundant; even weekends have no meaning anymore as, because MOTH and I have been working from home, work is an any day, every day, any time thing.

And so food seems to be the thing that is keeping us all going – literally and figuratively. The highlight of most days is the coming meal. It is a marker of time passing and something nice (hopefully) to look forward to, something that is different to the previous day. Mealtimes have become the main event rather than the punctuation. But here is a danger; the comfort or boredom snacking, accompany this with not being out and active and you can understand why a rotation of jogging bottoms are becoming my staple wardrobe. I’ve not helped myself by coming up with a dangerously easy, tasty quick bake, the recipe for which is below. The cats appear to be in on it too and I couldn’t count the number of times a day I refill their biscuit bowls. They, however do not have jogging bottoms. And the birds are no better.

On an unrelated food note, do you ever feel like you have the same things over and over again? After feeling like this a while back, I started keeping a list of the different meals I cook and it’s now in the seventies. And yes, I realise this is a very nerdy thing to do. But trust me, when you have the mind-blank of writing the shopping list for the week – it helps to be a nerd.

For a life writer, this lack of doing anything makes it very hard to write about, well, doing anything. Before you know it I’ll be telling you about the ironing or how I’ve re-labelled all my wallet files (and just how is it that in a supposedly going paper-less world there is still just so much blinking life-admin paperwork?) or even tidying the stationery drawer, which is on my radar to do. Perhaps we will all end up with a new level of tolerance of the mundane where every-day activities are the height of excitement. On a serious note, we might all be learning to find a new joy in smaller less exuberant activities, which actually, I think could be a good thing in a way.

Whatever you are all not-doing this week, I hope it is punctuated by some lovely food. I for one am off to have supper after posting this and to think about what we need to get out of the freezer to cook tomorrow.

And, just when is bins?

For my easy soft-bake flapjack recipe, click here

Easy soft-bake flapjack

This is a really quick and easy basic recipe that is perfect for adding in whatever you fancy as little extras.

Ingredients:

4oz oats milled or blitzed in a blender or just as they are (I use gluten free)

4oz ground almonds

5oz butter (melted)

3oz sugar (caster or soft brown, whichever is your preference)

Method:

Mix together the dry ingredients then stir in the melted butter.

Cook for 20 minutes at 180 degrees (fan)

Little extras:

So far I have tried:

Orange zest and cinnamon

Cranberries and apricots

A layer of cooked apple in-between two layers of flapjack

Chocolate chips

Observations on a week including athleisure and cake

I find I have been regularly wearing my running leggings – with absolutely no intention of going running whatsoever. Let’s face it, with the way things are at the moment, no one is going to see me, I could just as well be wearing a shark costume and party hat for all anyone would know. But they are comfortable and there is always the possibility that I could, if the spirit took me, spontaneously launch into exercise (pause whist taking a moment to haul self, up off the floor from laughter at this idea.)

A year or so ago we saw the spread of athleisure and I, like many, scoffed. But frankly, right now I see the appeal. Clothing, athletic in its heritage, but worn for leisure and comfort. It reminds me of a black and white tracksuit I had when I was about eight, I loved it. I don’t know why as, although obsessed with ballet, I wasn’t exactly sporty even then.

The odd thing is, even though I have in the past been out running in my sports leggings, I still wouldn’t conceive of just popping out casually in them. Why? Surely jiggling about, wobbling uncontrollably in them would be worse than just wandering down the high street (ok, a notion not on the cards right now anyway) and yet it feels as if it is okay to show every bulge and bump, as long as it looks like you are making an effort to do something about it.

I am also at this juncture, once again marvelling at the truly frightening way advertising manages to hack right into life because, of late I have had many adverts turn up anywhere I log on line all luring me to buy leg sculpting, bum lifting, waist restraining sports leggings How? I don’t know, I’m pretty sure I’ve haven’t written or looked at any before now, but merely mentioned them in passing to MOTH who wondered if I might be about to do something dangerous, like jog. And, as much as I would like a pair (for the aforementioned possibility of spontaneous sport or for ignoring such) this is not a time for frivolous shopping. If any companies spot this blog and want to send me some for free, fair do’s otherwise, it’s the old faithful pair and stop showing me things I am not going to buy. Stop it!

But I am also hankering after a house coat for completely the opposite end of the wearing clothes spectrum. Before we went into lock down, I was making a concerted effort to wear some of my nicer clothes more often, particularly dresses. But I am a clumsy person, to say the least. Despite craving clear surfaces, calm rooms with no clutter and an easy way around the place to just ‘top-up’ clean – I am, by nature a creative mess maker. And clumsy. Very clumsy. Hence, the fancy for a housecoat. But a nice one – with pockets. Something I could feel almost as glamourous in as a nice dress underneath. Actually, I’ve always been quite taken with 1920’s fashion and so a pair of flouncy silk day pyjamas under a fabulous housecoat (with pockets) would be ideal especially now it is a rare occasion to leave the house.

Speaking of housework. With us all in lockdown and the weather flip-flopping between spring and winter, it feels as if it is the perfect time to have a good old sort out of the house. Overflowing cupboards, wardrobes and drawers could be purged and the house given a jolly good spruce up. But, there is one huge flaw in this plan. What to do with all of the things you decide to get rid of? We can’t take things to the recycling centre or to charity shops and unless you are lucky enough to have a spare storage shed sitting empty to stash it all in, the only option is to have it hanging around in boxes and bags getting in the way – or just putting it all back where it came from.

I thought I’d found a perfect thing to crack on with sorting out that wouldn’t cause too much excess to get rid of. That was to finally gather up all my hand-scribbled recipes, together with those I have torn out of magazines or printed off and get them sorted and all in the same place in some discernible order. And that is what I did. Or rather, that is what I started. Two recipes written up neatly and then a glance at the huge pile to go and I gave up. And wrote this instead.

But, one of the two recipes I did manage to write up was for what I am calling, ‘Molly’s Muffin Loaf.’ For the recipe and to find out why it is called that, just click on the link here.

Molly’s Muffin Loaf

It was my niece’s birthday recently but with us all in lock down we were, of course, unable to be with her. But, that did not stop cake in our family, oh no. It merely increased it. We held a remote family bake off with the theme of ‘fruit’ chosen by the birthday girl. We shared pictures of ourselves with whisks and spatulas held aloft and aprons donned as the start time approached and then many, many more as the baking continued. In all, seven bakes were made – one even all the way in New Zealand. The thing we all came to realise though, almost a week later, was that not being able to share our cakes with each other, we had to eat them all by ourselves. Oh well.

Here was my contribution which only seemed fitting to be named after the birthday girl.

Molly’s Muffin Loaf: An orange, blueberry and cinnamon muffin cake with orange glaze – gluten free

Ingredients:

170g (6oz) gluten free plain flour

50g (2oz) gluten free oatmeal

170g (6oz) butter

170g (6oz) soft brown sugar

3 eggs

2 tbs flaxseed

1 ½ tsp gluten free baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

Pinch of salt

Zest of 2 large oranges

Small punnet of blueberries

Method:

Cream the butter and sugar together

Beat in the eggs, one at a time

Fold in the dry ingredients and then the orange zest and the blueberries (I like to slightly crush the blueberries to make sure some of the juice mixes with the cake.)

Bake in a oven pre-heated to 160°C (fan) for 45 minutes, or until knife comes out clean

While the cake is baking, simmer the juice from the oranges with some brown sugar until it is thicker. Remove cake from oven and prick all over with a fork then spoon the glaze over. Leave in tin for ten minutes to really soak in.

Lentil, tomato and spinach soup with popped pumpkin seeds

Makes 2 large bowls

Ingredients:

150g red lentils
600ml vegetable stock
1 tbsp vegetable oil
1/2 brown onion
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
1/2 tin chopped tomatoes (around 200g)
1 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp turmeric
Salt and pepper to taste (I prefer lots of black pepper and only a little salt as the stock cube will have salt in too)
1/4 tsp dried oregano
1 large handful of spinach, finely chopped

Method:

Heat the oil gently and soften the onions
Add the paprika and turmeric and cook for 1-2 minutes, stirring
Add the garlic and tomatoes, cook for 3-4 minutes then blitz/blend and return to pan
Add the stock, lentils, salt, pepper and oregano, cook until the lentils are soft – around 20 minutes, stirring occasionally (lentils can have a habit of sticking to the bottom of the pan).
Add the finely chopped spinach and cook for 1-2 minutes
Serve with popped pumpkin seeds sprinkled on top

Popping pumpkin seeds:

Heat a non-stick pan on a high heat, dry (no oil or butter)
When hot, add the pumpkin seeds, stir or flip regularly so they don’t burn, until they stop popping
Put the popped seeds in a bowl and season with salt and pepper. (You can add other spices such as paprika or chilli for extra flavour and heat.)

To read my blog about cooking this in deep winter, click here

Tales from the kitchen: The Beast

As I write, we are in the clutches of the beast; that is, The Beast from the East, as the very cold weather we are having this February and March has been dubbed. I admit to being cynical about just how bad it would be, let’s face it, it wouldn’t be the first time something was over-hyped, but for once, it seems the predictions were correct.

We are currently snowed in. Not into our house per se, but the small rural village we live in is inaccessible from either side, residing as it does, at the top of a hill. Despite the efforts of the local farmers going out to try and clear the roads, the wind is continuously blowing banks of snow back again This has resulted in a tailback of stationary cars at the bottom of the hill, unable to proceed.

As lunchtime approached, let’s face it there was only one thing to be done: soup. I fancied something thick and hearty and with a good bit of flavour – if only to try and penetrate through the horrible cold I have been sneezing my way through for nearly a week.

So, I set abut a lentil, tomato and spinach soup (a link to my recipe is included below) but, distracted by Big Cat, who is momentously bored due to being stuck indoors because of the snow, I had a false start. Perhaps I should begin the recipe instructions as follows: once you have set your onions softening, do not get distracted trying to find various bits of string, elastic, beads and the such to make further impromptu cat-entertaining toys to hang from various door frames etc – because your forgotten onions will burn and you will have to begin again.

Big Cat is a very amiable fellow and will often spend hours during the day running around the garden chasing mainly leaves and insects. He is not a natural hunter and when he does catch something, he tends to wander around with it in his mouth, unharmed, looking at you as if to say, ‘This is mine. I don’t know what I do with it now, but it’s mine, yes?’ The general rule of thumb in our house is, if we manage to get a caught critter from Big Cat, it will be happily and healthily released back into the wild. If Small Cat (who is quite possibly 89% evil) catches something – there is no hope for it, whatsoever.

Big Cat has been mooching about, following me around for the last two days, shouting at me as if I were deliberately not clearing the snow away so he can go out and play. Small Cat just sleeps, demands food and occasionally pulls drying washing off the rack to attack it before chasing his brother around the house.

As the soup steamed up the windows and filled the house with gentle spice aromas, it was time to pop the pumpkin seeds. If you have never done this, I suggest you give it a go. Not only does it result in a tasty snack or topping – but it is fun too. As they heat, puff and then split they tend to jump skyward, left and right as they pop. Enthusiastic errant seeds can zoom across the room a good couple of feet if they are feeling particularly feisty. When the outer layers have split and you put them in a bowl with a little seasoning, they make a wonderful crunchy popping, sizzling sound as they cool.

It may be -14 out there with the wind chill today, I may be wearing six layers, plus three pairs of socks, scarf and hat in the house and had to scrape ice off the inside of the windows earlier, but it is all worth it because it made me make this lunch. I love it when food is a pleasure and is somehow fitting to the occasion. There would have been no satisfaction eating this on a hot summer day, but today, it couldn’t have been more perfect.

For my lentil, tomato and spinach soup topped with popped pumpkin seeds recipe, click here

When is a courgette not a courgette?

No, this isn’t the start to some kind of awful joke but a genuine pondering I had a while ago.

This year, having got our vegetable patch underway for the first time, we were fully prepared for the ups and downs and experimentation of what may or may not grow well. Our biggest failure of the year seems to have been the carrots. I can’t help thinking that it was perhaps the wonderful in many ways but exceedingly hard Suffolk soil, which when baked by the sun turns into solid clay, that may have been our downfall. I imagine that somewhere under their sprouting tops, they were secured more tightly than middle-class ladies at a health spa wrapped in mud and clingfilm and left in the dark to doze and snore to the questionably soothing sounds of some whales or a heaving rainforest. (Just why the sudden shrill call of some kind of anthropoid or feathered creature is supposed to be relaxing I am not sure.)

But one of the absolute rip-roaring successes has proved to be courgettes – in fact, almost too much so.

It got to the point where we were not only growing more than we could consume on a regular basis but that they were also rather oversized. This led to us greeting friends and family not with a hearty ‘hello’ and enquiries as to their health, but with, ‘do you like courgette?’ If the poor unsuspecting person answered yes, whether in truth or out of politeness, they were then proffered a ridiculously large green vegetable and we could sigh in relief that we had managed to reduce the stocks a little. Even our plumber did not escape and left, after sorting a leaky radiator, with one of our verdant monsters.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if courgettes happened to be our favourite vegetable but as it is, they feature among the bottom rungs of the veg league – if there were to be such a thing. MOTH (Man Of The House – the husband) particularly declared himself not a fan and so I set about finding ways in which to disguise this slightly insipid but amazingly fruitful food.

Garlic is a good one. Cook them in plenty of butter and garlic and all is well. Use them to bulk out vegetable dishes swathed in a tomato sauce and they disappear nicely into the background giving a good supporting role.

But after weeks of hiding them in various savoury ways I was getting a little bored so decided to try a different tack and go sweet. Using vegetables in baking is nothing new but I live with a man who is steadfastly traditional when it comes to cakes and so I knew it would be quite a challenge to make something he would try once, let alone eat a whole piece of.

And so a courgette cake I made – my own recipe – which I’ve included a link to below, and, well, I thought it was rather yummy. MOTH was brave and took a bite (admittedly before I told him what was in it) and, although not a particularly enthusiastic response, the comment ‘it’s alright,’ I took as pretty positive from someone who has quite an aversion to such things. (I did note however that it was just the one bite that was eaten – the rest I shared with my lovely singing group: The Kettle Girls.) I promised that the next cake would be more traditional, and it was: a classic sponge with jam and cream, followed not long after by a chocolate and choc-chip cake with chocolate frosting. (My teeth hurt just thinking about it.)

I don’t have a particularly sweet tooth myself and quite like the raw and earthy textures and flavours of more natural and less intensely sweetened things and I wonder if it could be traced back to The Brown Book.

When we were growing up, one of the cook books in our home was what we, the children, called The Brown Book. Everything about this book was brown from the recipes to the front cover, even the paper it was printed on seemed to have a light hue of brown. (I do believe it was from the 1970’s – which could explain a lot.) The titles of some of the recipes might give you an idea: Buckwheat Pancakes, Soya Burgers, Lentil Sprout Salad, Millet Cookies.

(At this point my conscience dictates I put a word in: the reason I can tell you these recipe titles is because I now have a copy of that book. Further confessions tell you that actually, I quite like the look of a lot of it now and it would be doing a huge disservice to my mum to let you think that the above was what we were served daily – it wasn’t – it was just the odd moment of Brown that appeared and made us kids roll our eyes. To this day I still can’t hear the word Carob without thinking of it’s treacherous lie that it is ‘like chocolate’ – it is not!)

Actually, our birthday cakes were really quite spectacular. They were always made into some fantastical shape or scene: butterflies, trains, dogs, someone fallen over skiing, a clog – you name it, we’ve had it. It was even only a couple of years ago, when one of my sisters was studying to be a vet, that a cake was made depicting a horse – mid operation – including red boot laces for innards.

Often, being the ones making the cake was as much fun as being the recipient of them. Holed up in the kitchen having shut out the birthday girl (who knew exactly what was going on but would pretend that they didn’t) a creative flurry of cake, icing and decorations would take place and usually so many of the sweets, chocolates and the such bought for decorating were eaten in the making of the cake, that by the time it was presented and the candles blown out no-one could face eating any more – for an hour or so anyway.

But, back to my original question – when is a courgette not a courgette? I was pondering this because ours grew so large it was often asked if they were now a marrow. Well, there is some debate online: some say a courgette left to get so big becomes a marrow, others say that there are still horticultural differences but that they are both a squash. So, when is a courgette not a courgette – when it is a marrow – or not – but definitely when it is a squash. Perhaps.

You can find my Courgette Batter Cake recipe by clicking here

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Courgette Batter Cake

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Ingredients:

8oz (225g) courgette
3oz (90g) light brown sugar
3oz (90g) soft dark brown sugar
8oz (225g) self raising flour
1/4 tsp baking powder
3 eggs
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp maple syrup

Preparation:

Pre heat oven to 160◦C fan (180 conventional)
Grease and flour baking tin

Method:

Grate or blitz courgette
On a medium heat cook the sugar, courgette and maple syrup until melted, soft and smelling like toffee – around five minutes then leave mixture to cool for around ten minutes
Whilst the sugar mixture is cooling, beat the eggs in a separate bowl until they are large, frothy and pale
When the sugar mixture has cooled, mix in the flour and baking powder and combine adding the oil to loosen
Gently fold in the eggs until all combined and the mixture resembles a batter
Add mixture to the tin and bake for around 30 minutes

Pear Sponge

Ingredients:

4 pears
1 apple
8oz (227g) SR flour
3oz (85g) soft brown sugar
1tsp cinnamon
1tsp ginger
2 medium eggs
100ml olive oil
1/2 tsp vanilla essence

Preparation:

Pre-heat oven to 175°C (fan)
Grease and line tin

Method:

Peel and stew the fruit and let it cool
Mix together the dry ingredients in a bowl
In a separate bowl mix together the stewed fruit, olive oil, egg ad vanilla essence
Fold the dry ingredients into the wet mixture
Put mixture in the tin and sprinkle the top with brown sugar
Bake for around 30 minutes, let cool in the tin for 5-10 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack.

Bread, High-heels and the Inheritance of Hands

Breadandheels

A couple of years ago I began making my own bread by hand and it has now become an at least twice-weekly event. People often ask, “Isn’t it really hard to do?” and the answer is no.

However, I have recently made an addition to my bread making routine which I haven’t yet come across in any books; high-heels.

At 5’3” I know I am not actually that short but it is just short enough to find standard kitchen worktops just a couple of inches too high.

To give bread a good knead it is better to be able to exert some downward force and I found that I was always standing on tip toe whilst doing so. Making bread can be a bit of a work-out in itself but doing so at the same time as standing on your toes makes the experience rather more wobbly.

After joking many times that I should keep a pair of heels in the kitchen – not only for bread making but also to access the shelves in the cupboards (sadly just the lower shelves, the top ones are still out of bounds, heeled shoes not withstanding) – I eventually did it one day.

Now I can be found wearing my wedges whenever making bread – regardless of what else I may be dressed in. That’s right, I may be in my pyjamas getting an early loaf started, or in my comfies, having a relaxed day, but whenever there is the making of bread – there will also be my heels.

Making bread at home is something my mum always did. There is a running joke in our family that you could build houses with mum’s bread as it is dense and solid in the way that only true wholemeal bread can be. But, we loved it as children and we love it now.

It is the thing that will always be comfort to us: mummy’s bread – preferably with marmite.

It was the go-to food when we were ill, when we were running in from an after-school sports session and needed something to fill the gap before tea – and as we got older, it was the thing consumed late at night, giggling and in overtly hushed tones when we had staggered in from the pub.

I was terribly bullied at school and I remember on occasions when I came home in a not so good state, mum would either have or get some bread on the go and would encourage me to take out some anger and frustration by pummelling the dough. This was a great distraction for me at the time, if only for a short while, but now I believe that bread making, along with all cooking and baking, is best done not with anger but in a happy state of mind.

Many times, food made when ill, tired or angry has just not turned out well at all and I do believe the mood in which you make something can have an impact on how it ends up.

I am very lucky now to be able to make my bread overlooking our garden and often get treated to a good deal of bird watching – my current favourite visitors being the pair of wrens that I have seen many times hopping about the pots on our patio.

As I am kneading the dough I often reflect on how I have my mother’s hands and how she in turn had her mother’s. They are not pretty hands, they are not slender or delicate and never have prettily painted nails. (I try sometimes but invariably I have chipped, imprinted or got something stuck in the varnish within minutes of it going on.) But, they are working hands. Caring hands.

For my three sisters and I, our mum and our grandma; hands are for doing and creating, they are for caring for people, digging the garden, creating fun with paint, glue, needle and thread, they are for living. And I love them.

I haven’t always loved them, as a teenager I used to look in a kind of intrigued envy at the delicate gesticulations of people with slender fingers, small wrists and the tiniest of rings that could slip easily onto any finger. They were fascinating to me and I used to long for the same – usually when desperately trying to get a ring off a reddening giant knuckle that I had dared hope would fit.

But as happens so often, as you get older you begin to appreciate things in a different way. I can still feel the touch of my mum’s hand on my forehead when she comforted me as a child when ill in bed. The skin may have been rough, but the love conveyed could not have been more gentle. And I hope that my hands give as much care and love as they did.

When I come in from the garden with my fingernails full of mud and my skin prickled and scraped, I know that they have done a job and one that will either result in something yummy to eat or be a beautiful thing to look at.

And when I cook and bake I will always be reminded of my grand-ma and cooking with her in her kitchen with the old Formica table and how there was always porridge cake (my family’s name for flapjack) to be eaten and copious jars of fruit bottled in the pantry having been picked from the garden.

Hands and bread making – just two things that have been passed on along the female generations of my family – but, I think I am the first to introduce kitchen heels into baking. I wonder if it will catch on.