Becky Bakes…

This week saw us trying to buy a new fridge. You can imagine the moment when I realised the old one just wasn’t cold enough and didn’t respond to a change on the dial. Finding a website where a similar one was available was taking too long, so we made a quick trip to our local independent store on the High Street and explained our crisis. Immediately the young man booked us a delivery slot before we discussed exactly what I needed. Within 5 minutes we’d chosen the replacement and knew exactly when it was coming (today!). I’d been planning to discuss air fryers with you this week, in light of the growing anxiety about forthcoming fuel bills, and had hoped to have done some research by this morning, but with the fridge situation that’s been curtailed! Up to now I’ve only met one person who actually has one and uses it frequently and swears by it. The initial cost can be quite high and it seems that, on average, I’d need to use it 83 times before I recoup the cost. It uses super-heated air circulated at high speed and very little oil needs to be used so food cooks very quickly. They seem great for small quantities of food, so probably not economical for family meals. I still haven’t made my decision – it would need to be put away when not in use, but would it then be a case of “out of sight, out of mind”? Have you bought an air fryer? Any thoughts and feedback would be appreciated x

This week it’s been lovely to catch up with TV programmes I’ve missed and one of these is Stanley Tucci in Italy. The second episode is all about the Piedmont region, which happens to be my all-time favourite part of Italy. Why? Well, having lived in Milan for several years we visited all the expected places but avoided Turin, the home of the Shroud and yet another car factory. It was a school visit that took me there many years after we’d left and I regretted not having visited sooner. The architecture, the porticos to protect pedestrians from the weather, the bicherin (a drink of hot chocolate, coffee and cream) and the lack of tourists – wonderful. The Slow-food movement began there as a reaction to all the fast-food outlets opening throughout the country. Our trip took us to Alba, where the truffle auction had taken place earlier that day, and we enjoyed a delicious tasting menu with truffles featuring in almost every course. The biggest shock/surprise of the trip was being told I was due to teach a class of year 9 pupils and was required to make pancakes with them. Straight away I changed it to scones and sent out for ingredients – quite a mission as Self Raising flour isn’t common, with yeast being the preferred raising agent. It transpired that the pupils had little spoken English so I had to do it mostly in Italian, but we managed to make perfect scones and ate them with butter and jam. Not quite what I’d expected to be doing, but it made the trip worthwhile. What a way to “Find Piedmont”!

Having managed to avoid Covid for the last two and a half years it has finally caught up with us both. For anyone who questions why we vaccinate against “just a cold” I can assure them that it’s a lot more than just a cold. You won’t want to read all the symptoms… Many of my friends have impaired or compromised immune systems and for them to catch this it would be very dangerous. Strangely enough, without any inkling of what was about to hit us, earlier this week I felt compelled to complete a whole list of outstanding tasks, a trip to the dry cleaners, the pile of ironing – you get the idea. So staying in bed till mid- morning was easy – no guilt – and two happy cats, were it not for feeling dreadful. One of the many downsides of all this is that we’ll have to miss several events planned for this weekend, not least the chance to meet up with relatives we rarely get to see. Hope you stay well x

True to our word we returned to the allotment with our young friends, this time armed with suitable containers to transport our harvest. Careful not to look greedy we gathered a small collapsible crate-full of apples, with just a few pears. In the meantime, I was on crabapple duty – a task which was more tricky than I imagined. As I pulled a bunch of them off the tree many more fell to the ground, needing to be gathered as well. Help was at hand and very soon we had a shopping bag full of golden cherry-sized fruit. The next day it dawned on me that making jelly with all those would take a very long time, so I started early in the morning. Because of the sheer quantity I couldn’t leave the fruits to drip overnight so the pulp was composted quite rapidly. Measuring the juice and calculating how much sugar to add was left to my Maths expert but nearly 3 kilos went in. Bubbling away for nearly an hour, skimming off the scum and bottling nearly 11lbs of the stuff was very satisfying and will provide our young friends with produce to share!

Last weekend we spent some time visiting young friends who have recently taken over an allotment. To say it was overgrown would be an understatement, but they have begun to clear it and even created a very smart raised bed. Sharing the work (and the fruits of their labours) with friends is a great idea and gets them all out into the fresh air away from their everyday jobs – computers, keyboards and the like. Imagine my surprise when we fought our way through the gate and came upon trees dripping with apples! Obviously I had to try one, it would have been rude not to. It tasted like no apple I’ve ever tasted before, so crisp, juicy and sweet. That was just the first tree, there were two more which were clearly different varieties as well as a crabapple smothered in tiny golden jewels and a promising pear too. We carried away as much of this harvest as we could but realised we’d need to come back soon with boxes and crates to gather more before they fall and rot. A quick search reveals that one tree could be “James Greave”, another is a “Granny Smith” and then also a Pearmain, or maybe a Pippin? More research is needed so we have a return trip booked already x

There have been numerous occasions during the course of this week when I’ve felt compelled to sit and watch TV. Not normal daytime stuff – Escape to the Country, The Bidding Room etc – but the events unfolding in Balmoral, Edinburgh and then London. Many times I’ve been close to tears, as have most of us I’m sure. Operation London Bridge has been in place for much longer than we were aware of it, but the plans are being revealed to us on a daily basis. How incredible it was to see and hear the proclamation of the new King at St. James’ Palace – a protocol of which I wasn’t aware. I shall certainly continue to watch each stage of the events, possibly with a large cup of tea to hand. We loved seeing the Queen enjoying tea with Paddington Bear, tapping out the rhythm on her beautiful teacup. So with a gentle nod to their mutual appreciation of marmalade, today we are bringing you a bonus recipe. Take a look at the Recipe Page on this website where you’ll find Marmalade Cake. x

We are deeply saddened by the death of our Queen.

Earlier this week I found myself queueing to buy cups of tea for some of the “Cake Friday” merry band, in a bakery/coffee shop/sandwich bar famous for it’s sausage rolls. I’m sure you know what I mean 😉 Standing in line behind several other customers I noticed a sign stuck to the perspex screen but had to really lean forward to be able to see it, much to the consternation of the person in front of me in the line. It seemed to announce a change to one of their sandwich ingredients – mayonnaise. Due to the war in Ukraine they were unable to source sunflower oil and had switched to rapeseed oil. Immediately that raised a red flag in my head. A young friend of ours is very allergic to rapeseed oil as well as the pollen produced every year causing the flu-like symptoms of severe hayfever. Other people we know have allergies which are much more dangerous and can result in hospitalisation. Accurate labelling is absolutely crucial to protect everyone with any dietary issue. So well done and thank you to Greggs for making it quite clear. Let’s hope other producers maintain safe practices.

I was surprised to hear on Radio 4 this morning that Suffolk had experienced extreme downpours this week. I’m not sure that’s absolutely accurate – it might have been wiser to say that some parts of the county had heavy rain, because we certainly didn’t see it here. There have been a couple of showers since last weekend, but not enough to make a significant increase to the levels in our water barrels. The grass is now so brown that it will be nothing short of a miracle if it revives. Some plants are losing their leaves already and even the roses have stopped flowering to conserve energy. We are still getting plenty of ripe tomatoes as they are getting the last of the rain water and I was pleased to give away the excess earlier this week. I will put some in the freezer today – even though they are mushy when they thaw, they will be added to soups, bolognaise and casseroles during the winter. On that note, I shall be making plenty each time in preparation for the winter ahead. It’s going to be a challenging one by the looks of it and we’ll all have to be economical in whichever way we can.

It’s been quite a while since we’ve had any significant rainfall in our part of sleepy Suffolk even though there have been torrential downpours just a few miles away. The grass is so dry that our cats are reluctant to walk on it as it hurts their feet; many plants are wilting and drying out before they even flower. We’re being careful with water, even letting it cool in the washing up bowl to throw onto the beans and sweet peas as well as the hibiscus and anything else that’s started to droop. All this reminds me of an assembly given every year to the pupils in the New Barnet school where I worked many years ago. A colleague called Gus would tell the children of the importance of water to all aspects of life, that it’s a resource we need to use with care. His advice about toothbrushing comes back to me every day – to turn off the tap whilst brushing, that way we’d all be doing our bit to preserve this precious commodity. After nearly 40 years I can still hear his words – “Just turn it off !”