Bread Pain Pane Brood Brot Aran

Bread Pain Pane Brood Brot Aran
Baking @Granton:hub

Friday 14 October 2011

A bread calendar

Bread is around all the time like tatties, milk and bananas, but it also has a seasonality which we should celebrate. The delight at seeing the first swallow of the year comes alongside the first sighting of hot cross buns. Having everything in its season heightens the pleasure when that time finally comes around. With that in mind here is a bread calendar starting with blackbun and shortie which abound round here in January. Shortbread is still bread? 

In February we made snowdrop breadsticks at Falkland Stables workshops. Not traditional (yet) but the snowdrops were certainly seasonal. Once Lent is over and you can get wired into eggs, butter and sugar, pancakes seem like an excellent idea, just a squeeze of lemon juice and pass the golden syrup. I'm not exactly sure when Shrove Tuesday is, but pancakes every Tuesday in February should cover it.
In March I meant to try a simple Simnel cake made with yeast not bicarb/eggs but it didn't happen. Originally these very fruity cakes were baked for their mothers by girls in service when they returned home during lent. In April my Hot Cross Buns did arrive, minus the crosses to start with but still edible. We had fun with a batch or two of hot noughts and crosses buns but my wife told me not to play with my food. Maybe you can just make out the noughts and crosses on the slate in the photo on the right.













Selkirk Bannock head - which month do you want to go in? Oh, don't worry about me, I'll go anywhere, May if you must. I get eaten all the time. Now about my left arm ....






June might have been barbecue weather occasionally but I think this damper bread was finished off in the oven, sorry.

Summer fruits on, not in bread in July. What would life be like without jam!



Lammas fair in August was originally "Loaf mass" to celebrate the first grain harvest. In my head at least, the rolls I baked for the Fife Diet Broomhill Summer barbecue were Lammas breads though with the poor summer, well in advance of any wheat harvest.
In September our wee plum tree excelled itself yet again though there was less fruit than last year due to pruning, enough for loads of jam but this year we missed out on plum cake. Big mistake. It keeps well, sometimes almost till the next day. 


This October I would like to try apple loaves and also potato bread using a recipe from the Bourke Street bread book; not mashed potatoes as you might use in tattie scones but big chunks baked into the bread. Then in November maybe chestnut bread though probably using supermarket chestnuts. Chestnut flour is more expensive than gold dust so maybe just a touch for flavour.





In December Yule is the celebration of the winter solstice, the perfect time for this Danish yeasted Yule cake. To follow that what could be better than home made Stollen for Christmas day. Freshly baked stollen is so succulent compared to shop bought, it is a real revelation. I enjoyed making/eating both these at the end of last year.



2 comments:

  1. A great roundup of the year Colin :)

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  2. What a FABULOUS blog, I discovered you through Jac at Tinned Tomatoes! Wonderful year of bread!
    Karen

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