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REAL BREAD, EVERY DAY

Is there a more traduced and reduced yet basic foodstuff than bread? How can we possibly have allowed this staff of life to have been subjected to the degrading influence of the Chorleywood Process and how can we, as intelligent consumers, have been duped into believing that something that comes in a plastic wrapper and that keeps for weeks, is bread?

I will admit, I fell for it. Before I began to question seriously what I was actually eating, in terms of the ingredients of the food I was buying, I bought bread in supermarkets usually thinking about how long the loaf might last and would it freeze OK. Now, I am not going to launch into an assault on supermarkets; they are necessary and in any event, if we are naive consumers, we will buy badly. It is our responsibility to buy well – not just what the supermarket has on offer that week. There is good bread to be found in supermarkets, but it’s never on the shelves at your eye line: you will need to bend down or look up to find it.

You can find Crank’s Wholemeal and Poilane Sourdough in UK supermarkets and no, it won’t be the cheapest bread BUT it will not have fillers, colours or preservatives in it and best of all, it tastes wonderful! There is however, a “but” and that is cost. At the time of writing, a 450g loaf of Poilane Sourdough is £3.00 and a Cranks Organic Wholemeal at 800g is £1.55. Both of those are expensive and whilst worth it, not perhaps sustainable dependent on one’s budget.

There are alternatives in supermarkets and we all need to become avid label readers to avoid some of the ingredients that appear in some loaves. I kid you not when I say the following are used regularly in bread in this country: Calcium Propionate (to inhibit mould growth), Soya Flour, “Vegetable Oils”, Emulsifiers…….

If a loaf needs a mould inhibitor, to me that says something quite profound about the product; neither of the loaves mentioned above use them and it doesn’t sit easily with me to eat it. I have read of studies linking it to damage to stomach lining, adverse behavourial effects on children and migraines. I make no claims to be a medic but for me, if I don’t need to eat an additive, I don’t.

Soya Flour: any person knows that this has mixed press. I am not going to get into an argument for which I am manifestly not qualified to arbitrate, except to say that because of my medical history, I avoid Soy in all forms.

“Vegetable Oils”: nothing too horrid here, unless this is hiding the use of Palm Oil, which from an environmental perspective, can be a disaster. This bothers me, so I have researched this topic and have elected to avoid it wherever possible and where it is needed, try to use products with sustainable Palm Oil sources.

Emulsifiers: As far as I can see, these exist to soften a dough and/or harden a dough. Really?

So what on earth are these things doing in bread? It’s because as an ill-informed public in 1960’s, the vast majority of people in the UK just wanted cheap food. The Chorleywood Process was born and our daily bread went downhill fast after that. No wonder that our bread became, by and large, the laughing stock of Europe. If you want a blow by blow account of the Chorleywood Process, I recommend Elizabeth David’s  excellent book “English Bread and Yeast Cookery”; it is worth reading if only to understand that we should never allow the wool to be pulled over our eyes in such a way again.

Mercifully, there were enough people left who did value real bread and thanks to them, we now have the choice to buy real bread, made from good flour, yeast, water, maybe a little honey or sugar, and a fat with integrity. The wonderful RealBreadCampaign.org is a great place to start looking for your local baker and then please, please support them! Good bread isn’t cheap, but I come back to the fact that few things are more influential on our everyday health than the food we eat.

These fabulous people also support home baking and I have been experimenting with an everyday loaf that can fit into a busy life. I started with Doris Grant’s Wholemeal Loaf, adjusted it via the Ballymaloe Brown Yeast Bread recipe and have finally landed on a version that suits us. I make this every week, and it’s easy to double up the quantity for a bigger family. Don’t be deterred by the use of fresh yeast: I buy mine from ocado.com and freeze it. Please don’t think this is onerous or any way difficult; it really isn’t but there is one problem: it is far too easy to eat too much of it! Making this bread doesn’t involve bouts of kneading or baby-sitting bowls of dough (although that can be very satisfying sometimes); it’s hard to believe something that tastes so good can be so simple to make.

 

If Edoardo and I are exercising (some) self discipline, this keeps well in an airtight tin (I use a cake tin) for several days. It also freezes well but doesn’t seem to last so well after thawing, but that isn’t a problem for us.

Honestly, this is so simple, when I began to make it, I was astonished that it fitted so well into my busy life. I have also experimented with the ingredients and have added seeds to the mixture, replaced some of the wholemeal with granary or strong white (for a lighter loaf) and also made a half quantity with added walnuts. On the whole, I like the original – which also makes divine toast – and it comes in at about 84p per loaf!

SIMPLE WHOLEMEAL BREAD

Print Recipe

Ingredients

  • 450g strong wholemeal flour
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp honey
  • 425 ml blood heat water
  • 20g fresh yeast (non GM)
  • sunflower or pumpkin seeds (optional)
  • room temperature unsalted butter
  • 1 x 1 kg/2lb loaf tin or any tin measuring about 12.5cm x 20cm

Instructions

1

Preheat the oven to 230 degrees C/210 degrees fan

2

Measure the flour into a large bowl

3

In a small bowl or jug, mix the honey with about 150ml of the water and crumble in the yeast. “Crumble” can be misleading as fresh yeast can be quite sticky, so do your best to add it in small pieces, rather than one lump

4

Leave in a warm place for up to 10 minutes, during this period, grease the tin lightly with the butter; it is possible to use sunflower oil, I just prefer butter

5

Check that the yeast is coming to life; it needs to be popping tiny bubbles to the surface and if it isn’t doing this, it doesn’t matter if it takes a few minutes longer to acquire the frothy head that is needed. If you are not seeing any movement, you might have dud batch of yeast; it does occasionally happen but in a year of baking this loaf, it’s happened only once to me

6

When you have a frothy head (no, when the yeast mixture has a frothy head…), pour into the flour along with the remaining 275ml of water and mix it up. Don’t mix until all the water is in, otherwise for some reason, it will go to lumps from which, in my experience, there is no way back!

7

The mixture should be too wet to knead but not too liquid.

8

Put directly into the greased tin and sprinkle with seeds, if wanted.

9

Cover with a clean tea towel (prevents skin forming) and leave to rise.

10

This can take between 10 - 25 minutes depending on the ambient temperature

11

Once the dough has risen almost to the top of the tin, put into the hot oven and give it 20 minutes

12

After that time, reduce to 200 degrees/180 degrees fan and leave it for 40 minutes

13

At 40 minutes, slip the bread out of the tin and knock on its bottom with your knuckles; it should sound distinctly hollow

14

If it doesn’t yet sound hollow, slip it back into the tin and give it another 5 minutes

15

If you want crisp crust all over the loaf, leave the loaf out of the tin for the last 10 minutes of cooking but omit this step if you want softer crust

16

A point on the rising stage, if you get absorbed in something else and forget about your loaf so that it rises to the top of the tin, it will slightly overflow the tin when you bake it. It will not affect the flavour of the main loaf, although you will have a “muffin top” on your loaf, which may become a bit too crisp.

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IN THE SOUP

When our British weather sends us something miserable, is there anything more comforting than a bowl of homemade soup? Is there anything else that tells us that life isn’t that bad and it will get better? (OK, so wine or chocolate work here too) After all, think of the theme of so many of the advertisements for bought soups; they usually focus on the homely theme or on the fresh and natural aspect. So far, so good – until you read the ingredients or check the cost. Not so good.

I read recently that tinned soups are one of the biggest offenders for salt and as for ingredients, I am speechless (not a frequent occurrence….). What on earth are Wheat Flour, Citric Acid, Modified Cornflour (modified how?), Polyphosphate and Sodium Phosphate doing in soup? Fresh soups are by far and away less offensive on the ingredient front but that is unfortunately reflected in the price.

It is possible to easily avoid these dilemmas by making your own. It is so easy to make soup, it almost criminally simple and once you have the Foundation Recipe under your belt, you can use whatever ingredients are seasonal, well priced, or just what you fancy!

Before I dive into the Foundation Recipe, I want to just make a few comments on the ingredients I have listed:

I soften my onion, carrot and celery mixture in olive oil, unsalted butter or a mixture of both. It depends on the flavour I want to achieve; you’re free to use what you like, including sunflower oil. Personally I avoid rapeseed oil as I can always detect it in a soup (or indeed in most dishes) and I dislike it.

Note too that the ingredients I just listed are not mandatory. I pretty much always use an onion (or shallot if I want a more subtle flavour) and frankly, carrot and celery isn’t always needed.  I find it helpful to just take a moment before I decide, to imagine the end flavours I want to achieve; if it doesn’t include carrot or celery, I don’t use them.

Stock is a fraught subject that can bring normally calm, restrained cooks to scarlet-faced fury. Yes, it is lovely if you can always have homemade chicken stock to hand and if you have had a roast chicken and you have the time, yes, make some. But, please, don’t stress about it, or even shy away from making soup simply because your freezer isn’t stocked with homemade stock! It is perfectly acceptable to use bought stock (Waitrose and Truefoods both produce excellent stock without salt) and I always have Marigold Organic Reduced Salt Bouillon Powder and Kallo Organic Very Low Salt Vegetable Stock Cubes in the cupboard. That Swiss brand or the three letter brand – don’t even go there. Have you read the ingredients?

Garlic – love it, so it finds its way into most of my soup. If you don’t like it, don’t use it but might I plead with you to give it a gentle try in at least tomato soup?

OK, sermon over, let’s get started. I have tried to give very clear instructions here and if I have over done it and trespassed into the “teaching my grandmother to suck eggs” territory, sorry, but some of you might never have done this before and I am a tad evangelical about the numerous benefits of homemade soup!

In terms of cost, this comes at about £1.29 and can serve four as a first course or two for lunch as a single course. This compares well, I believe, with about £1.89 for 600m of fresh tomato soup in the supermarket. Yes, tinned tomato soup is cheaper, at about 99p for a well-known brand. But does it really taste of tomato?

Now, moving on to other flavours. You can make soup from pretty much any vegetable, pulse or bean. Let’s say you want lentil soup: soften the soffrito as above then instead of tomatoes, add a couple of handfuls of red lentils and perhaps cumin and a scrap of dried chilli flakes. You might need more of the stock at this stage and also, lentils are devils for catching on the bottom, so keep the flame low and stir frequently, while the soup simmers lazily, with the occasional plop. You might want spinach and broccoli soup, so add washed broccoli florets, let them cook for about 10 minutes and then add washed, torn spinach, cooking for another ten minutes or so. This is splendid with a scrape of nutmeg and a generous amount of cream and in my mind, does need blending before adding the cream.

You can experiment, vary and play with this foundation recipe to your heart’s content. The only thing I would say is try to keep it seasonal and use left over vegetables, too. They just need less simmering. I did try to make something once with left over roast potatoes. Don’t. Just don’t. Horrid. Oh and taste, taste, taste as you go, and if you do succeed with roast potatoes, let me know!

In The Soup

Print Recipe

Ingredients

  • 1 medium onion, peeled and chopped into 0.5mm dice
  • 1 medium carrot, peeled and chopped into 0.5mm dice
  • 1 stick celery, chopped into 0.5mm dice and if it’s a bit stringy, swipe a potato peeler down it to whisk away the strings
  • This combination is called a soffrito in Italian cookery. I know it exists in French cookery too, but a) I can’t remember the French word for it and b) my heart is in Northern Italy and particularly in her kitchens!
  • 1 tbsp olive oil
  • 1 tbsp unsalted butter
  • 1 (or more) cloves of garlic, finely chopped, or crushed under the blade of a knife (see over in My Kitchen under Techniques for how to do this)
  • I tin Italian tomatoes, chopped or whole - no matter - but they MUST be Italian
  • a few sprigs of fresh thyme
  • 1 tbsp Italian tomato puree
  • 1 litre chicken or vegetable stock - see above
  • salt and freshly ground pepper

Instructions

1

Take a pan or flameproof casserole with a thick, heavy base. I use an ancient and much loved 20cm Le Creuset which has been with me for more than 30 years

2

Put it on a low heat, add the oil and butter then the soffrito, stir and allow to soften until everything becomes soft and fragrant

3

Under no circumstances allow this to burn, so you might need to be a bit hawk-like at first, until you understand how your pan and flame perform together

4

You can add a modicum of salt at this point, but go easy

5

Add the garlic and soften that too, but again no burning, as burnt garlic is just horrid

6

I like to add the thyme at this point and to be honest, don’t always bother to strip the leaves off the stems; they will fall off in the process of cooking and just remember to fish out the stems before you blend

7

Add the tin of tomatoes all in one go; if they are whole, mash them up a bit with a wooden spoon

8

Add the tomato puree and then the stock, using at this stage probably about 750 ml, and stir everything round

9

Add a few grinds of pepper, partly cover the pan having brought the contents to a gentle simmer

10

Leave it for about 20 - 25 minutes, stirring occasionally to ensure nothing catches on the bottom

11

The soup should reduce a little during this process, which helps to concentrate the flavour

12

Turn off the heat and let the soup cool a little

13

This is the point at which I like to blend a soup, usually using a trusty Kenwood Stick Blender which is just so easy to wash up (just remember to fish out the thyme stems!)

14

You can of course, use a conventional blender or food processor, and indeed you can leave it chunky and rustic

15

After blending, it may appear quite thick so just thin it out with the remaining stock

16

To finish, swirl in some cream, yogurt or creme fraiche and top with a sprinkle of finely chopped chives or parsley