The little things in life...: gbbo14

So I missed week 2, what a let down! It was a busy, busy week with Daisy's garden party and when I had a free minute it was all hands to finishing everything for that and getting it all ready for the weekend. Priorities and all that!

I'm disappointed this week was bread week. I've never been able to make bread. As Mr Hollywood said this week, patience, patience, patience! I have zero. It always looks okay but tastes vile and ends up being thrown out like a brick to the birds who won't touch it and then a few days later I have to bring in to the bin to avoid rats!!

However, I'm trying to stick to the themes a little as a bit of a challenge to myself, although I did think about another Swiss roll week, just because!

But no I stuck with my guns and decided to make a white loaf.

I had some yeast in my store cupboard from Aldi and on the back was a little recipe for a nice white loaf, so I followed this, to an extent.

Recipe

1 yeast packet (7g)

1 1/2lb strong white bread flour

1oz butter

450ml of water (1 part boiled, 1 part straight from the tap)

2 tsps salt

I thought this may be a little boring so added in a little flavour, bit of chopped basil, chilli flakes and some Lazy red onion. If nothing else it made the dough look pretty!

So you mix it all up and knead for 10 minutes, if you are lazy like me and you have a dough hook on your mixer let it do the hard work for you. I left it knead for about 8 minutes and it was a very sticky but incredibly stretchy texture, it stuck to the bowl like a stretchy slime. It looked wet but didn't feel it.

Getting it into the greased tin was a bit tricky! So it didn't look very pretty, let's go for rustic!

I did consider kneading it on a floured surface before putting in tin but I didn't want to risk knocking the air out of it and turning it into a brick again.

It says cover with cling film and leave in a warm place. The sun was blaring through the window so I popped it on the coffee table to sunbathe and hopefully double in size...

Well it escaped the tin...

I kind of pushed it back a little and hoped for the best!!!

In to the oven on a soft bake option.. Instead of sticking to a specific time I smelt when it smelt cooked (how amazing does bread smell baking?) and also tipped it out and knocked the bottom, if it sounds hollow it should be done!

Ta-daaaaaaa!

Miracles happen... It's actually very tasty!!

Lots of love,

Hayley xxx

So following the start of the Great British bake off and Polly from Polly's world linky (click here) I have made a Swiss roll in with the theme of the first programme. I decided to go for a lemon version, recipe by the hairy bikers!

Ummm confession number one- I didn't make my lemon curd! Aldis version did the trick!!!! It's hard enough baking with a baby to entertain too.

- First up grease your flat tin and set your oven to 200'c

- Then whisk the eggs, caster sugar and lemon zest up until it resembles meringue type texture - takes about 6 minutes in a stand alone Kenwood

- Fold in the flour with a metal spoon, very gently so not to knock any air out of it

- Smooth gently into tray, ensuring it reaches all of the corners and then pop into oven for around 8 minutes (recipe says a bit longer but it was really going gold so any longer and it may have burnt!!)

- When it's done and out of tray roll it up when warm- a trick mum gave me is to use a wet tea cloth to stop it cracking (it worked for me!) and then leave it until completely cool

- In meantime whip cream ready to fill it

- Unravel and spread on curd and then cream. The hairy bikers make a butter cream type icing but I just whipped double cream.

Curl back up and dust! Ta daaaa!