Bread.... and the book that inspired me

I've been making a lot of bread lately, and I've been so pleased with the results. I have been making no-knead bread like this for quite a while now, but still had that niggly little voice in my head pushing me to try making bread the 'real' way again.

So, for a bit of inspiration I bought myself this book -

Its part of the River Cottage series of book and I have to say, it is the best bread book I've seen (and I've borrowed A LOT from the local library!) It goes into a lot of detail initially about the ingredients and the whole process of making bread, as well as the history and why we should all try making our own, before it shares a whole load of recipes. I found it strangely interesting! It even has instructions at the back on how to build a clay oven ... something I would love to do with the ugly old brick bbq we have out the back.

I've been making Roti breads -fabulously quick and simple, great to make with kids. The whole process takes about 10 minutes from getting the ingredients out to flopping the big puffy pillows onto plates (or maybe 5 mins without children helping!) We were all cheering as they puffed up in the pan! Perfect with winter curries and casseroles and they cost next to nothing to make (flour, water, salt).

bread dough using 1kg flour (note my daughters hand for size!)

Then after making a batch of dough that could rival the 'magic pudding' story, we made 2 loaves and 4 large bread rolls with this lot above. I generally use both unbleached white and wholemeal flour, often around 3 parts white and 1 part wholemeal (or whatever I feel like!)

Some I left plain and others coated in oats. All turned out perfectly! The crumb of these breads is very different from my usual no-knead loaves, which is much more like a sourdough texture. The traditional bread texture is much more even and is much easier to slice and use for lunchbox sandwiches.

I think I much prefer the free-form shape, rather than baking them in a loaf tin. Perhaps its the more home-baked look, with each loaf taking its own shape :-)

I have made quite a few now, each working well, and trying different shape loaves and coatings. I have recently tried using bakers 'strong' flour, but actually found the cheap brand plain white worked better for me. I think I will try half/ half next time.

Last week we made pizza bases for the first time and it was so easy I am kicking myself we haven't been doing this earlier! No photos unfortunately, I forgot this time and the pizzas vanished so quickly, even though from 500g flour we got 8 smallish pizzas (about 15-20cm across)
I put out bowls of various veggies and pineapple, and the kids delighted in making their own combinations- all 8 different to each other. So different to greasy take-away pizza, much more like the traditional style.

I am looking forward to trying more recipes from my book, everything from focaccia to croissants, and poppy and caraway crackers.. mmmm!
I bought my copy from The Book Depository online- only cost me around $16 which was a bargain, (amount changes daily with the exchange rate) I've easily saved that in bread already, not to mention it was the only book that actually got me great results!

Costa's Garden Odyssey

How great is this new show? I love it! And how wacky is Costa? He is like a hippy Steve Irwin of the gardening world, all animated and arms flying!

I watched the third episode last night and it was so full of interesting and useful bits and pieces. I loved the permablitz idea, where groups of volunteers work to transform someone's garden, and in exchange they learn whatever skills they are interested in by hands-on work and in workshops. It reminded me a bit of the native gardening course I did last year, there was a lot of weeding, planting and mulching! but I learnt a lot both in the classroom and outside.

I think it beats the other 'lifestyle' shows on tv hands-down (Better Homes than mine etc) there is a lot less fluffing around sticking lace onto plantpots (or whatever!) and a lot more gritty, useful permaculture-based ideas.

Anyway, if you haven't seen it yet, despair no longer! You can watch them online and get all the info HERE on Costa's website.

I'm looking forward to episode 10 at the end of next month, he has done a segment from right here in the Blue Mountains!

Costa's Garden Odyssey - SBS Thursday nights 8pm

The Age of Stupid

After much anticipation, the movie 'The Age of Stupid' opened in Australia last week, and I went to see it yesterday.

Lots of you will know about it, and I know some have already seen it, but for those who don't know it is a 90-minute movie about climate change, set in the future (2055) starring Pete Postlethwaite as an archivist looking back at media footage from 1950-2015 and asking why we didn't do something about climate change when we had the chance.

check out the website for more info -- http://www.ageofstupid.net/


Here is the trailer --

The Age of Stupid Trailer Feb 2009 - SD from Age of Stupid on Vimeo.

I have been thinking about how to review it, and have decided I can't do it justice with my interpretation. But I can tell you I came out of the movies like a stunned mullet. I am pleased I went alone to see it, as I couldn't talk to anyone for a while. It thought it was really well-made, engaging, fascinating, shocking, terrifying .... and definitely thought-provoking.

There was more documentary footage than 'movie', which was great as all of the footage shown from 1950-2008 were genuine events, and the fictional component to the movie is based on projections from factual scientific data that is widely available now.

It delves into the effects of extreme weather conditions, peak oil and the big oil companies, consumerism, alternative energy and more, but presents it all a 'watchable' and very humanistic way, and some of the characters in the movie will stick in my mind for a long time.

I thought I was quite aware of what is happening around our earth, but this movie still managed to shock me. The way it was presented was like an alarming wake-up call at full blast.



If you possibly can, go and see it.



And then check out what you can do about it ---

http://www.notstupid.org/