U is for… Urns
When we visited the Rose Garden at Ashton Court recently we noticed that the border walls to the adjacent Italianate Garden at the back of the Mansion had been restored with these elaborate urns and sculpted heads and stopped to take some photos. If you were reading my blog last year you might remember the ha-ha and the cows, this is all in the same place. Continue reading
For those of you who are suffering from withdrawal symptoms…
I’m still baking every week, just haven’t baked anything new, sticking to the old favourites of toast bread and sourdough.
This is yesterday’s loaf of my regular sourdough with a little rye flour for flavour and colour.
250 g white starter (25 g active starter, 100 g strong white flour, 125 g water)
75 g rye flour
325 g strong white flour
200 – 220 g water
9 g salt
For full details of how to make this bread have a look at Weekly Sourdough Bread, a big tutorial style post.
This is something of a labour of love; the trouble with making your own tomato sauces is that you get spoilt and don’t want to buy the shop stuff. It is labour intensive and, unless you have really good cheap tomatoes, probably not worth it from a financial point of view. However, nothing tastes as good as home made passata and you can adapt the recipe to suit your family’s palate.
The recipe we work off is from Pam Corbin’s wonderful book Preserves, one of the River Cottage Handbooks. We have made many other lovely preserves and chutneys from this book. Recommended !
Zeb Bakes 