Quick blog – just shove some pictures in. Simple.
It was brioche today in the Bread Group and the results were excellent, which makes it hard to make jokes about.
One tiny fault – if you put too much glaze on top it can run down to stick to the pan and stain the bottom. Doesn’t seem like much of a fault to me – who bothers to look at the bottom when you’re eating fresh bread and jam.
The samples that we had at the break were wonderful, helped by a brilliant batch of home made Hedgerow Jelly. Modesty prevents me from telling you who made the jelly, but I’m sure you can guess. It was so good we sold out.
I’m not sure about the calorific value of the samples, but while I was watching Gail mix the dough last night I was struck by the thought that I’d never seen so much butter outside a supermarket. The Titanic was sunk by something smaller than that! (It’s not a link to what you may be expecting – click it and see).
It was a great session and good to see so many people there.
Because of timings they can’t do the whole thing in one day so next time they meet (16th April because Easter intervenes) they will be making dough and then taking it home to bake.
Such is the life of a bread teacher.
We also had New College out doing their animal course, and as usual in Spring there was a lot of hugging of animals being disguised as work. Still, you’re only young once and it takes a really hard-hearted curmudgeon to look at a cute newborn lamb and think of food.
Have to go now, my mouth is watering.
Must check how the mint is growing…
This American in the UK must ask: what is hedgerow jelly? Immensely curious. My parents were both farm kids back in the 40’s and 50’s and I wonder if they may have had something similar–my dad has talked about various jams his mother used to make but I can’t recall any of them now.
We have plenty of hawthorn, elderberries and sloes in the local hedgerows so it seems a shame not to use them. We also use blackberries but tend to save the crab apples for crab apple jelly as we don’t have many. I’ve seen recipes suggest rose hips but I’m not sure about possible problems from the small hairs they contain.
With so many seeds in the mix it’s best to make a jelly by straining the whole lot through a jelly bag overnight.
Nice seeing everybody today. Brioche was great too!
Fantastic Fun making the Brioche today, more fun eating the efforts made by Gail.
I will tell you this, Simon is too modest about the Hedgerow Jelly that he made, it is really rather excellent. Sold Out? no surprise