Making 2000 year old bread

When two different people, at opposite sides of the world send you a link on the same day, to the British Museum site showing Giorgio Locatelli making 2000 year old bread, you get that strange feeling, that fate is pointing a finger!

We've been to Pompeii and Herculaneum several times, and I was very interested in the Bakers' premises, and have seen one of the carbonised loaves of bread.  I searched my blog for my entries for when we were on Holiday In Sorento back in September 2010, but I had not written up very much at all...having intended to go back and update.  With a little bit of searching I found the pictures...how about this one of the bakeries.  They had their own mills to grind the wheat, they were made of basalt, and I have heard it say they were turned by donkeys.

Just thought I would put in this lovely mosaic...I imagine the doves eating the spilled grain, but here they are raiding a jewelry box..sure there is a metaphor here for innocence being compromised with jewels!

Just as now, they found evidence to show that people also baked at home, even though there were many largish commercial bakeries.

I varied the recipe given on the British Museum site a little, as I felt the salt was very high.  I even used my special salt from our holiday in Sicily from the area where Romans harvested salt from ancient salt pans.

Overnight I allowed 125g spelt flour, together with 200g water, and 3g dried yeast to develop in place of the ferment given.

With 400g stone ground organic spelt, and 400g wholemeal flour on the workbench, I added 12g salt, 10g Diax, as I was not sure what 'gluten' in the recipe meant, and gradually worked in about 520g water into which I had disolved 6g dried yeast, as well as all of the overnight ferment.

I gave it the kneading, and just the one rising as given in the video, then used string which I had soaked in water to prevent burning, and cut the top into wedges.  I wanted some smaller loaves so made two with the quantity given.

Here they are cooling on the rack.    I had put one of my little heart cutters, covered with foil and weighed down with a little stone.  But only on one of the loaves.

I had thought maybe the string and loop was used to hang the loaves up whilst they were cooling, but found out that the crumb is still very tender at first, and it started to pull through the loaf.  Once cool the string stays in place.  Having seen bread shops all round the Mediterranean, and also very old paintings...I think maybe the loops were there so that several loaves could be hung up on poles in the shop, and also carried together by the delivery men, strung on poles.  I also wonder whether the loaves were hung up from the ceiling in houses so that mice and rats could not get to the bread overnight.

Anyway, many thanks to Debbie in Kenilworth, and Lizzie in Australia for your Facebook suggestion and link.  It has been great fun making these.  If Debbie is back tomorrow from one of her many forrays with Keith to interesting parts, I shall deliver one of the loaves to her!

Haworthia Tessellata in flower

I first acquired this little succulent last year at the Shrewsbury Show.  Sometimes the leaves appear full and plump, and sometimes more flat...whatever its condition, it is fascinating to look at its leaves from the top surface.  Sometimes it is called Star Window Plant, which is completely apt.

From the initial one rosette I now have three.  The first rosette has sent up flower spikes, but I have pulled the stem out.  The latest one I have left...and it must be about the longest flower stem in proportion to the plant that I have seen.

70cm long, and it is still growing

The individual flowers are quite delicate and have a green lines...

The plant is in full sun, which is why I think the leaves are a little shrunken.  I shall move it to a little more shaded area and see if the leaves plump up again.

Meloui

Meloui is a delicious pan cooked small bread, made with semolina, and with a careful technique of folding, forms a delicious flat bun or 'pancake' with flaky components.  Jane Mason collected this recipe when she went to stay with friends in a little house on a beach in Morocco.  This is the latest Bake from the Baking through The Book of Buns on Facebook, which brings me bang up to date.

We've been to Morocco twice, and looking back at our photographs, I found the one which shows some breakfast breads we had at a 'farm hotel'.

I know that one of the guides was really proud of the semolina flat breads in the basket, and now I am sure that they must have been Meloui.  I think it was his Mum who had made them.  We had a selection of freshly prepared breads, orange juice and orange blossom honey, and dates from the farm.  Wish I had asked to go and see the kitchens.  Many people still speak French in Morocco, so I have enjoyed speaking with Moroccan stall holders.  This is just one of the pictures of the many Toroudant Bread Stalls, which I took.

I am a bit of 'pest' sometimes, as before I make something, I like to find out a little more about it, and get influenced to change things a bit, and sometimes veer astutely from the recipe or technique.  Mostly I have been straight forward and not researched until after I have baked as far as The Book of Buns is concerned.  However I was tainted in advance of baking the Meloui.  If you want to follow the technique as per Jane Mason, then only look at the technique on youtube after you have made your first batch.  I am sure there are many ways of making buns, after all just how many techniques and shapes are there for scones in England?

I had a bag of organic semolina flour from Shipton Mill, which I had been using to spread on baking sheets, and coating muffins, but now I would be able to use it in a bake and taste its lovely flavour.  Of course, there is white bread flour too, as well as the semolina.  For the filling instead of butter or olive oil, I used my lovely Wharfe Valley Extra Virgin Rapeseed Oil.  I found that by smearing the worksurface in a little oil, I could stretch out the dough, fold and shape it easily.  I ought to have made a second fold to make them a little less high...but then there is nothing like hands on and making ones own mistakes, to arrive as the perfect shape!  My special Huckaback linen towel which I use for covering my bakes is now soaking in some detergent to remove the oil..

I did not use anything like the amount of oil stated in the recipe, so if using oil, put about half in a shallow dish to dip into, and top up if necessary.  But then maybe the remainder would have been used in the frying pan if following the recipe.

A careful rolling with the rolling pin means that you keep the circular shape, something I got better at towards the end.  I chose to use a griddle rather than a frying pan, as I wanted to keep the oil to a minimum, and had room to cook 6 buns at time.

Penny and little Daniel arrived during the rolling up process so they were my first tasters.

As soon as the last one was off the griddle we sat down together in the conservatory, with honey, butter, strawberries from the garden, blueberries and a nice drink.  The Meloui are really delicious, and so much like the ones we had on our trip from the cruise ship.  We had one each warmed up again for breakfast.  This time I put some runny honey in a little dish, and dipped 'peelings' of my bun into it.  With their swirls and layers....they make lovely tactile finger food for breakfast or with mid morning coffee.

In a Vase on Monday - Apprentice Pieces

Just in time to get this posted on Monday...and that is the only true attribute about this entry.  Cathy is quite liberal about the rules...she just wants us to keep going, and even if we don't post, the regulars love to go any time of the week, to see what other have been posting.  So do start with Cathy's memories of her Grannie.

The 'Vase' is a tankard...A very lovely one, hand painted but by an 'apprentice' so a bit wobbly in places.  This was given to me by my little sister Jenny, on her return from France.  For her year 'in the field' for her degree in French, she taught in a School in Rouen, and felt her finances then, could not attain the heights of a master's piece.

Jenny loved the Dahlias at the local shows, and I have been keeping the best for this vase.  I love this tankard, and it sits on my desk usually full of knitting needles.

The arrangement was not made on Monday but Saturday.  I have made one today with similar flowers, but for the one I am posting here, I had my 'apprentice flower arranger'.  Izzi loves the garden, and flowers, and as soon they arrived, I had Izzi in the garden choosing flowers, and having cut them, I handed them to her to put straight in the bucket.  We talked about putting different flowers together, and also using foliage.  We chose some green and some lovely leaves from an Acer which was just begining to turn.  The secateurs were a little too large, but with scissors she looked for some for her posy.

The other reason I wanted Izzi to help is that I wanted to share with her my tradition of making arrangements for people's birthdays...and Saturday was 'Great Aunt Jenny', the giver of the tankard's birthday.  As she is abroad we took the pictures, and posted on facebook.  I then explained to Izzi that we then need to think of someone to give the flowers to, and we decided they would go to her Mum.

Here is Izzi, with her very own first 'In a Vase on Monday'.

We found a lovely little very heavy cut glass vase in my cabinet, and now Izzi has that to use in her bedroom for little flowers.  We also picked some nasturtium seeds for her to grow next year.  You can see that I am taking Grandma and 'Teacher' of In a Vase on Monday, and flower grower seriously

Tootmanik s Gotovo Testo

This a Bulgarian yeasted bake made with a milk and butter dough, which is then layered with lovely white crumbled feta cheese, with egg to bind, and a sprinkling of fresh herbs and topped with paprika.  These days I am favouring Sainsbury's  oak barrel aged feta cheese, bought loose from the deli counter.

This was the bake from 1 August from The Book of Buns Facebook group, but since it would need more than just two people to do it justice, I was saving baking this for a visit from the Wastells today....Veronica has some friends from Bulgaria visiting this coming week, so it will interesting to hear back as to how close this is to the buns enjoyed out there.

As I wanted this to be baked and out of the oven, warm for lunch, I knew I would have problems, but with starting the first part: kneading and rising overnight, I had plenty of time for the rolling out of the layers, filling and allowing to rise.  I feel that there may be an errata in my book, and I shall consult with others and then post here.  The initial shaping involves preparing 9 small squares, then interleaving with butter, but then rolling to the shape of the tin...and with a tin of 12cm x 12cm, the dough amount would have risen many inches.

I used my Brownie tin with a clever pull out section.  I put the dough on the flat tray then slipped into into place.  I bought this some time ago from Bakery Bits, and for this bake it works beautifully.  It is 9 inches by 9 inches, 23cm by 23cm.

The two cheese layers were topped with freshly chopped sage and thyme from the garden.  Within about a hour, the bun was well risen.  I brushed the top with butter, but decided to wait till it was out of the oven to sprinkle the paprika, as I did not want it to burn on the top.  I used some lovely smoked paprika and topped with some more fresh herbs.

It was really easy to remove it from the pan, by sliding the base out then sliding the the bun off the parchment onto the cooling rack.  The bun was the 'centre piece' of our lunch with lots of salad, cold chicken, smoked salmon, prawns, and lots of salady things.  The bread was really delicious, really soft tender, light and tasty.

When Matthew realised there were the Chelsea Buns for tea...he wanted one with a cup of tea for 'pudding'...well you have to indulge your son from time to time!

What did we all end up enjoying?  Izzi had brought a lovely white chocolate baked in her own smaller cake tins about 4 inches I would say, layered with chocolate butter icing, topped with with glace icing, and caramac buttons and other glitter stuff...all made completely on her own, (with a big mess which Veronica cleared up)...aged 5 1/2, in class 1, about to take her first ballet exam, in the choir, etc etc...so pleased to catch up with all her news.  I'm buying Book of Buns for Veronica and Izzi now.