Kitchen Garden Forum

I made bread with some mashed potato added, the potato adds a little flavour and structure to straight white bread.

I used frozen mash which is very convenient for those who cook for one person, I think it was 60 grams of mashed potato to a 500 flour mix.

I use a machine regularly though just to do the first mix and rise for white bread, has anyone else tried proper yeast and did it make a difference to the bread ?

On to soup, I'm going to roast some tomatoes today so I can have a go at your soup idea though it will have bits added as I go along, I used to be regarded as a very good home cook though that was by an appreciative family and bunch of friends that didn't make the effort. These days people are so much better educated about what flavours go with what, having said that I suppose there are still plenty who don't bother.

Soup is so easy and nutritious if you have a few cupboard staples and a little imagination, plus, I make soup for one or enough to freeze. Amazing stuff that clears your tubes if you add some kale.

Chin up robo, I stopped moaning since I read the recent "poorly posts" .

I've used live yeast a few times if you ask at your local asda they will give it to you for free they do at ours at least ,it did not make a lot of difference to the finished loaf

Thanks for that advice robo and the nearest Asda we have is one hour drive away, we have M&S thirty minutes drive together with the both Germans and Tesco. Fifteen minutes drive we have Co-op and A mini Tesco though most of the garages are mini markets.

I was inland over last weekend, I felt like Mick Dundee.

robo wrote:You can also add peppers and garlic it's up to the individual

Bugger, I forgot I had peppers. The tomatoes are roasted so this is what im doing tonight.

I'll cut some kale, trim it, finely, steam it and sautee in oil and garlic. Mix in the tomatoes I previously roasted, add a little parmesan and maybe a little sour cream then boil some spagetti to eat it with.

I have more tomatoes, sadly they are are all store-bought.

Kale then, Ill report back in morning.

It was lovely, the roasted tomatoes worked very well with the kale, sour cream and garlic. It was a powerful taste and will become a regular though she won't eat it because she won't eat kale so I'm on my own again.

Try it.

Richard - How are you doing with the pizza stone? We used it and have found that it makes much crisper and regular pizza. It's also good for when people are coming over, grab some dough, add toppings and "walla" good foods. The only thing I'd say is, watch it with an open fire - the stone cracks!

Open fire ?

We don't have open fires though a pizza stone could sit on top of the Morso stove we have in the lounge and though I never thought of that it might work.

I always use my pizza stone for pizza though I have yet to perfect a way of loading the unbaked pizza onto the stone which is in the hot oven so this is how I manage.

I prepare all the toppings whilst the oven and stone are heating up in the oven and get the dough base shaped and ready. When everything is ready I lift the stone out and load the dough onto it, this sometimes ends up a mess because I have yet to buy or make a peel.

Once the dough is on the stone it starts to bake from the bottom up and is possibly baked through by the time I loaded all the toppings on.

The best pizza base I ever made was a sour-dough flat bread, I have never managed to replicate it though mostly because I don't make pizza that often. Certainly using a plain flour gives a thinner base though then I get comments about not allowing the dough to rise.

You can't win sometimes.

Thanks for bringing the subject back to life because even though we have two frozen pizza in the oven I'm hot for making myself a nice fresh pizza with a sprinkle of cooked kale dotted about the topping.

Flat breads are a nice change from your standard slices of risen dough bread and make a nice parcel for a panini style meal. Try frying your standard dough pizza base instead of baking it in the oven, let it cool then slice it in half if it's risen during the frying. Sort of pitta bread then ?

Also, do try an overnight ferment of your dough in the fridge with just a pinch of quick yeast. It does make a nice chewy dough.

We were camping and thought we could make some bread on it... Didn't work.

It is amazing

If you get into making pizza more, try and get a pizza shovel - they're great for getting stuff in and out. Dusting the stone with fine semolina is the way to stop it sticking as well

Also, Tesco do a really good mozzarella - I think it's called pizza mozzarella, it's square shaped and significantly less wet than your usual ball shaped on
Sour-dough is amazing! If you're interested in different recipes there's this book : http://www.amazon.co.uk/372/dp/08578321 ... za+artisan It's got LOTS of tips and tricks. We've been using the stone for about 2 years and keep going back to this book

Hadn't thought about frying the dough - will try that!

Thank you for the overnight tip as well

Coincidence, the other day I've made soup for my wife. Though my soup was already previously ready, all I did added water and boiled in the fire. And then served it. Interesting thing is after making such ready made soup from Maggie, we didn't found it very tasty. However robo, it's good to know your cauliflower soup was delicious.

I made minestrone last week ,I was a bit disappointed it's the second time I've made it the first batch was far nicer

I make soup at the weekend to take to work & spend loads of time looking at recipes, which are fine, but the best ones are the made up ones just using what veg available on the allotment with or without meat.

I have found 2 things that really make the soup even more lush though:
A Polish multi purpose seasoning from Lidl's, massive catering size but cheap. It has a lot of salt in it so I sieve this out so am just left with larger proper pieces of something. (The label is in Polish as well so no clue, but looks like dried red pepper & things like that).
A dried soup mix from Holland & Barrett, also cheap. Now it's got Green & Yellow split peas, Green & Red lentils, Pearl Barley & Barley Flakes in it. They take a bit of time to cook so I had a few mushy spuds & carrots initially, but find if you take it off the heat when the real veg are ready the mix will actually just absorb the stock & soften. Although you do have to add more water or stock when getting ready to serve it.

Westi

Westi wrote:A Polish multi purpose seasoning from Lidl's, massive catering size but cheap. It has a lot of salt in it so I sieve this out so am just left with larger proper pieces of something. (The label is in Polish as well so no clue, but looks like dried red pepper & things like that).

This is Mikado przyprawa uniwersalna

The ingredients are:

sól, warzywa suszone 15,1% (marchew, cebula*, pasternak, liście selera, natka pietruszki, czosnek*, papryka, pomidory), wzmacniacz smaku: glutaminian monosodowy, cukier, skrobia kukurydziana, tłuszcz roślinny, przyprawy, aromaty, hydrolizat białka sojowego, ekstrakt z drożdży, barwnik: ryboflawina. W zakładzie używane są: gorczyca, surowce zawierające gluten, dlatego produkt może zawierać śladowe ich ilości.

Or as we say in English:

salt, dried vegetables 15.1% (carrot, onion *, parsnip, celery leaves, parsley, garlic *, peppers, tomatoes), a flavour enhancer: monosodium glutamate, sugar, cornstarch, vegetable oil, spices, flavours, protein hydrolysed soy, yeast extract, colouring: riboflavin. The plant used: mustard, raw materials containing gluten, because the product may contain trace quantities.

Hope this helps.

I must make trip to lidl again, I did stop going because I had exhausted the lines I was interested in and found some own brand stuff not to my liking but a recent trip suggest they moved on. Since the invasion from Aldi the place is always empty.

My soup making always reverts back to our favourite, celery, leek, potato, garlic, onion and mostly 70% liquidised. Sometimes a bit of cream, in the last two years since I grew French tarragon I add that with the zest of a lemon and juic from half.

We occasionally make a soup with lamb from a book recipe and like you Westi I find that soup made as a last resort out of what we have is always good.

Since I started baking bread soup is an absolute feast if we have a just baked and cooled loaf of crusty bread, I still throw more bread away than I eat though. But not the sour dough, since my sour culture got to be less sour and-so more palatable with more foods I can eat it a week old.

Living as simply as I do I use the range in winter as much as I can so my electricity bills are higher in summer. I got a real bargain after my latest rescue cat killed my slow cooker by counter surfing and knocking it to the floor. Tesco bargain, an elegant navy blue crockpot half price which I will use when no more fires needed. I did buy a halogen thingie but have hardly used it.. I have neff double fan oven and gas hob ( came with the rental/. I use the oven once a year at Christmas for roast potatoes) AND a microwave so a bewildering choice for cooking.. Great fun indeed... baking bread is not cost effective and too much energy needed ( I have M.E and energy is very limited)

I don't buy any bread now other than just to test the efforts of any artisan baker I come across or maybe from a deli supplied by a small baker.

I have problems with my hands so mostly use a bread machine too create the dough until tipping out, shaping and baking. It's very easy and is cost effective against the price of small bakers prices though not against the price of mass produced bread.

The problem with home made bread is that it's touted as easy like growing your own food when in fact you need a few years of making mistakes. I threw more bread away than I ever eat.