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The quest for perfect...FLAPJACKS

Sun, 15 Jul 2012 22:36:57 +0100

I’ve just realised that these are not actually flapjacks, but ‘bars’. Raspberry and pine nut bars. Bars. I’ve been confused or misled. I’m going with misled. Shame on you, nefarious, unnamed misleader, SHAME ON YOU.

Anyway.

I thought I’d found the perfect flapjacks in these beauts:

From here: http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/2381/raspberry-and-pine-nut-bars

Unfortunately, there’s an issue (even aside from the ‘bar’ issue which I covered extensively previously) insomuch as they require FRUIT. Will this tragedy never end?!

So what I’m going with is that these ARE flapjacks (FIGHT THE POWER!) BUT only if you have some fruit to put in the middle. I used rhubarb from the allotment, which worked our rhu-perbly. I prefer this type of treat less sweet so this was perfect. It would work fine with frozen fruit from Ye Morrisons/the bASDArds/Snailsbury’s/AN Other supermarket.

I should point out that AN Other is not a chain of supermarkets.

Here’s the finished article (NB: Not an actual article):

The recipe does actually make 12 good sized FLAPJACKS (in your face, BBC Good Food).

So in summary, the quest for the perfect flapjack if you have fruit is over already. I shall endeavour to now find the best flapjack without fresh/frozen fruit. This will be more in line with a traditional flapjack. It’s going to be oats of fun. Loads of fun.

Roast chicken. Poached for 10 minutes then rubbed with olive oil...

Sun, 15 Jul 2012 22:21:00 +0100

Roast chicken. Poached for 10 minutes then rubbed with olive oil and plenty salt and pepper cracked on it. I already removed the breasts for dinner so it may look a little paltry. Or poultry. Arf arf.

The quest for perfect...MUFFINS

Sun, 15 Jul 2012 22:17:16 +0100

I’ve tried a lot of muffin recipes, and have had the best luck with this one from the Hairy Bikers: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/lemon_and_blueberry_11428. Those lovable chaps. Look at them with their beards and their leather outfits.

They have a nice fluffiness to them and aren’t too sweet (the muffins, not the northern cooks), which is up my street. And that street is Tasty Avenue. Breakfast Boulevard. Or Muffin Mews, if you will.

Being a bit of a disaster on a shopping trip, I had no SR flour (I used plain with baking powder instead), blueberries (I called upon a mix of raspberries and currants from the allotment), or lemon (I utilised a tasty orange for the zest).

They turned out a treat nonetheless

The recipe says it makes 12, I got 10. If you want bigger fluffier efforts, (like the ones at the rear) I’d suggest taking it down to 8.

They are moist and well-risen, the berries give it a tartness (blueberries would give you a slightly sweeter muffin), the orange actually works really well and gives a warm bouncy fruity taste and the lemon curd is a treat, though I’d suggest putting an actual teaspoonful on each one, not a half teaspoon as I did. There’s a joke in there about curding your enthusiasm but I can’t work out what it is.

BIG TIP: When combining the wet with the dry, do no more than 6 big stirs with a metal spoon. It’ll look really not properly combined but it’s worth it to keep them risen. Less stirring the better.

I’d definitely do these again with berries other than the blue variety.

Anyhoo here’s the ‘after’ pic. Ate a baby one as I was about to have dinner so have placed a large one behind it to demonstrate the size. I now realise that with nothing to measure the size by properly, this was largely a pointless exercise. But I did it for you. Everything I do is for you.

In the quest for perfect muffins, next time I shall endeavour to:

Make 8, not 10
Put a good teaspoon of lemon curd IN the top of the mix, not on it, to produce that smidge more sweetness it needs AND have more lemony goodness
Only stir 5 times rather than 6

The quest for perfect muffins, flapjacks and roast chicken

Sun, 15 Jul 2012 19:27:01 +0100

It has been a jolly busy day, blog, a jolly busy day in the kitchen. Perhaps it was getting to know you again that raised my enthusiasm, perhaps is was coincidence. Whatever the reason, I embarked on a few quests.

The first is to work out a perfect MUFFIN recipe. I’ve tried muffin recipes many times but they are rarely good and usually a little small. I accept I’ll never get them to Starbucks-sized levels of size and fluffiness, but nontheless there’s a lot of room for improvement.

The second is to find a properly good FLAPJACK recipe. A favourite in our house, I’d like to get a solid base to which I can add anything (like a standard cookie dough) and which isn’t too chewy/crumbly/sweet/hard/crunchy.

The third is a good roast chicken.

I’ll level with you: the first two I’ve got a recipe (well, one each) and I’m all about perfecting them or moving on. Ok so let me get my shizz together and I’ll get some photos etc up.

14th July 2012: Pizza

Sat, 14 Jul 2012 19:03:00 +0100

PIZZA! I can start with pizza!

Saturday night is pizza night. Possibly the best night of the week. Definitely the best night of the weekend. So it is there I shall start.

I’ve been making homemade pizza for a few years now and am happy with my ability, but getting things written down can help improve so let’s give it a try.

How to do it: 250g strong bread flour mixed with 3/4 tsp salt then combined with 150ml warm water, 2 tblsp olive oil, 1tsp sugar and 2 tsp instant yeast. Kneaded for about 10 mins until springy, made into a ball then placed in an oiled glass bowl and covered in clingfilm. Leave it 1 hr to prove, then ‘knock back’ briefly and roll out into pizza trays. SMACK THE OVEN ON HIIIIIGH (for our crap electric effort this is around 220). Use semolina flour on your baking sheet/pizza stone to stop it sticking, blast whatever topping you desire on top (not too wet!) and stick it in the middle of the over for around 10 mins. Make sure the underside is not too pale or soft.

As I type the dough has finished proving and I’m off to roll them into the trays and fix myself a rum and cola while I do it.

Told you Saturday night was the best!

EDIT: First one is out the oven and oh my days it’s tremendous. EVEN IF I DO SAY SO MYSELF. Which I just did.

Tumblr, hello, remember me?

Sat, 14 Jul 2012 18:48:45 +0100

My my it’s been a while dear Tumblr blog I’m sorry I’ve been away so long.

What do you mean you didn’t notice?

Well I thought about you a lot; fleeting thoughts, but regular ones nonetheless. Nevermind all that not-posting-for-a-year nonsense. It’s in the past. I’m back and I’m changing direction.

No, hear me out….my quest to improve as a baker and home cook can be really helped by treating it as a bit of a project and blogging as I go. So that’s the direction we’re going in.

I don’t care if you’re not convinced: I’m doing it anyway. So nyah.

"I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow"

Sat, 21 May 2011 11:31:03 +0100

“I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow”

- Woodrow Wilson

GMO Capital's refreshing quarterly newsletter

Sat, 30 Apr 2011 09:40:00 +0100

GMO Capital's refreshing quarterly newsletter:

The Oil Drum highlights this fascinating newsletter raising the issue of our over-reliance on diminishing natural resources and the need for a radical, urgent paradigm shift.

But this isn’t written by an ENGO, it’s from GMO Capital, a firm with over $100bn in managed assets. Let’s hope it causes some major ripples.

Temple Nightclub's sustainable dancefloor

Mon, 28 Mar 2011 11:22:00 +0100

Temple Nightclub's sustainable dancefloor:

A nightclub aimed at sustainability which has a dancefloor where energy is generated from dancers? Yes please.

"Nowadays we are all of us so hard up that the only pleasant things to pay are compliments...."

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 10:04:07 +0000

“Nowadays we are all of us so hard up that the only pleasant things to pay are compliments. They’re the only things we can pay”

- Lord Darlington, in Lady Windermere’s Fan (Wilde, 1892)

Creationist applications to run Free Schools

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 08:59:00 +0000

Michael Gove, the UK Education Secretary, has responded to concerns from the British Centre for Scientific Education (BSE) about applications from creationist organisations to run Free Schools. He says that creationism will not be taught in schools and that it will not limit the science teachings in any creationist-run Free Schools.

But how can this ever be checked? If a creationist organisation is given the opportunity to teach children in a SCHOOL, they would want to teach creationist doctrine. And to be fair, they’d be within their rights to want to do so. But the point is that allowing a creationist organisation to run a Free School is potentially very dangerous.

There are already real concerns that faith schools fragment society and do nothing to discourage isolationism of ethnic minorities in this country, and creationist-run Free Schools would exacerbate the problem. That is to say nothing of the danger in allowing impressionable children to be exposed to creationist thinking on ‘science’, summed up nicely in a quote from Gareth Morgan.

Gareth Morgan is the head of The Everyday Champions Church in Newark, Nottinghamshire, who recently applied for permission to run a Free School. He said:

“Creationism will be embodied as a belief at Everyday Champions Academy, but will not be taught in the sciences. Similarly, evolution will be taught as a theory. We believe children should have a broad knowledge of all theories in order that they can make informed choice.” (Source: http://tiny.cc/7f462)

So kids, on one hand, we’ve got Theory A: Evolution, a scientific fact with reams of evidence. On the other hand we’ve got Theory B: Magic. Somehow I doubt that the two theories will be presented equally, with all the ‘facts’.

The world's biggest hole in the ground

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 12:09:13 +0000

The world's biggest hole in the ground:

Amazing images of the Mirnyy diamond mine in Eastern Siberia; regarded as the biggest mine on Earth.

green investment bank: a must

Sun, 13 Mar 2011 11:41:25 +0000

There’s been a wave of discussion of late about a proposed ‘green investment bank’, with the UK government setting aside around £1bn for set up, plus extra funding from selling off assets. However, the proposal is that the bank will NOT have the power to operate in the money market like a normal bank. This is not at all acceptable. Yes, confidence in the banking sector is low, but the expected cost of moving to a low carbon economy is astronomical, and, as Joan Walley, chair of the environmental audit committee stated: “Setting up a Green Investment Bank without the power to borrow would be a bit like trying to buy a house without first getting a mortgage offer”.

To move to a green, low-carbon economy and minimalise long-term costs as best we can, we must invest and invest big now. Set up a bank offering ‘green’ ISAs, ‘green’ savings accounts, and even shares in ‘green’ companies. The public can then choose to invest and the bank can grow its capital and work FOR the people. This is our opportunity to lead the world and make a bold, dynamic step into a low-carbon future, and I fear that if we don’t do it and do it right, we’ll come to regret it.

This is one of a collection of excellent, minimalist posters...

Sun, 13 Mar 2011 10:11:34 +0000

This is one of a collection of excellent, minimalist posters representing mental disorders, by British Graphic Designer Patrick Smith. The rest of the posters can be seen here: http://tiny.cc/lh4g5

Anthony & The Johnsons, Edinburgh Playhouse

Wed, 09 Mar 2011 22:15:59 +0000

Anthony & The Johnsons, Edinburgh Playhouse

Onshore wind in the UK

Wed, 09 Mar 2011 22:08:00 +0000

A debate I was involved in today got me thinking about the apparent obsession in the UK with onshore wind farms.

Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, said that opposing windfarms was ‘socially unacceptable’ (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/windpower/5045289/Ed-Miliband-says-opposing-windfarms-is-socially-unacceptable.html); a pretty daft statement to make, but it sort of picks up in this obsession with onshore wind as The Future.

I’m a fan of windfarms, but we are not China. We are not the USA. We are a small country, and even a dozen turbines can make a huge aesthetic impact on the landscape of a region. We don’t invest in offshore wind or tidal power because it’s expensive, but these are much more viable, sustainable alternatives in the longrun. Onshore wind is characterised by inefficiency and the huge physical footprint the farms leave.

The government seems to be all set on pushing onshore wind onto communities whether they like it or not, apparently due to the cost-effectiveness of the schemes. It’s interesting to note the rejection of the Severn tidal power project and the claims of horseplay in the process (http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/may/08/severn-estuary-tidal-scheme).

Let’s embrace The Big Society for a minute, and let communities decide if they want to own their own windfarms to generate their own electricity, but when we get to a national level, let’s be sensible. Onshore wind will most likely never produce a significant portion of our energy needs (without covering the whole country). Let’s get real, and spend money for a more sustainable energy future.

"I feel like no one ever told the truth to me: about growing up, and what a struggle it would be"

Wed, 09 Mar 2011 16:34:00 +0000

“I feel like no one ever told the truth to me: about growing up, and what a struggle it would be”

- Queen: ‘Too Much Love Will Kill You’

Upcycling

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 21:54:00 +0000

I was introduced recently to the word ‘upcycling’. Upcycling is about finding new (and sometimes fairly innovative) uses for goods which may otherwise be thrown into landfill or recycled. Recycling requires energy & resources to collect, sort and process, and in the UK, 1.8m tons of clothing and textiles goes into landfill every year (that’s just clothing and textiles; the most useful ‘junk’ for upcycling).

The website http://www.upcycling.co.uk has plenty encouragement for budding upcyclers (upcyclists?) and illustrates the process with ideas such as turning an old woolly jumper into a cushion cover; stuffing an old sock with carrier bags to make a draft excluder; or making a comprehensive kids craft box containing old pens, egg cartons etc; or maybe turning an old book into a clock.

But it’s not these nano-level arts and crafts ideas that catch my imagination; it’s the contribution that this type of thinking can have on our consumption practices globally. I feel like there’s an attitude of ‘I recycle, so I’m doing my bit’, and that’s great for what it is. But as a civilisation, we consume far more than we can deal with, and we need to shift the paradigm of consumption towards every person thinking about stopping the goods being produced in the first place. Upcycling , freecycling, and the mantra of ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’ all help us get towards a closed-loop system.

I find this rethinking of ‘waste’ fascinating. Sure, it’s just putting a name on something that people do every day across the world, but adding ‘upcycling’ to the language of consumption can help people think about material goods in a new way; even if it’s only a few people changing their attitudes, it’s done a job. And hey; what about this bit of upcycling: a project which converted a Boeing 727 into some sort of tree-top house.

Nevermind the three ‘Rs’, how about just one: rethink.

Daily Star journalist resignation letter over story he 'plucked from his arse' (link)

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 07:06:00 +0000

Daily Star journalist resignation letter over story he 'plucked from his arse' (link):

Those those who are unaware, the Daily Star is a UK newspaper which embodies all that is negative about the connotations associated with the word ‘tabloid’. It deals in celebrity tittle-tattle, racial scaremongering and lowest-common-denominator baiting.

The link attached takes you to a copy of the resignation of a journalist named Richard Peppiat, who resigned over an invented story and an attack of conscience.

What’s frightening though, is how he describes the environment at The Daily Star, where journalists are routinely pressured into writing the worst types of stories.

Let’s remember that this is a newspaper read by an estimated 1.57MILLION people in the UK (source:http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=1&storycode=46748&c=1). This is extremely worrying as we attempt to move towards a more broad-minded, inclusive society, but I’m left to wonder: ‘apart from prosecuting for outright false stories, what can we really do?’.

HS2

Sun, 06 Mar 2011 17:19:00 +0000

The UK government has finally launched a consultation on HS2 – a £33bn programme to develop a 250mph high-speed railway between London and Birmingham (with further plans down the line (excuse the pun) to extend it into Scotland). Proponents make bold claims about ‘bridging the north-south divide’ and HS2 being ‘good for the economy’. It will ferry BUSY BUSY BUSINESSPEOPLE to and from The London (it’s anticipated that 30% of travellers will earn over £70,000 per year) and will be good for the economy. Did I say that already? Oops.

200 miles of new track will be built, but the nature of the lines means they will need to be very, very straight. Which means there are significant limits on any course deviations, which in turn means large parts of Yorkshire, Staffordshire, Cheshire and Derbyshire will be cut up, and people like the Campaign to Protect Rural England and the Green Party are understandably concerned.

(But it WILL be really really good for the economy.)

Now there are a lot of people railing (another pun: I can’t help myself) against opposition to these lines, saying things like “Basically the greens don’t want people to travel. They want to to stay in one place and preferably just die”. But this isn’t a tree-hugging, stuck-in-the-past obstruction of economic progress; this is a reasonable protest to a plan which could be harmful on many levels.

The environment will suffer, as railway lines career through the countryside, irrespective of what gets in their way. It’s not just about a thin scar across the landscape; it’s about fragmentation of green spaces and animal habitats (including breeding grounds). Secondly, as rich people transfer onto HS2, we could end up with a two-tiered railway system, with the poor on one line and the rich on another. This type of social stratification helps no one. Thirdly, how exactly will the north-south economic divide be bridged? As the train rattles down the line, perhaps a beautiful rainbow will stream from its rear, depositing shiny gold coins by the track for Northern Folk to pick up and spend. Or maybe the BUSY BUSY BUSINESSPEOPLE will throw money out the windows? Running a train track up the country will not magically make everyone better off. Businesspeople will travel from the north to The London and vice versa. Fourthly, we’re talking about eventually shaving off 30 minutes from an already reasonable journey time. Really? £33bn for THAT?

This project is uneconomical and a bad idea on so many levels. Why not electrify the whole system? Subsidise train tickets (which are already prohibitively expensive for many people), add more carriages upgrade the lines….these all make much more sense. It seems that rather than fix a faulty system, government would prefer to spend a King’s ransom on a NEW system.

But hey, it IS good for the economy…..