Becky Bakes…

It could be that life is starting to go back to normal, here on the sleepy Suffolk coast. We have had some friends to stay for the first time in nearly 18 months. Filling the days with adventures and visits to new places, followed by delicious meals which hadn’t taken too long to prepare was fun. Inevitably there were a number of dishes you would be familiar with – family favourites – and they all went down a treat. Add into the mix some newer buddies too….it all adds to the pressure to make mealtimes a success. I think I can say it all worked very well, thank goodness. Some of the greatest successes come with the easiest of dishes, especially when fresh fruit is involved. I won’t tell you what I made, but I’ve shared them all with you over the last 18 months. Be assured, meals don’t have to be super complicated to be delicious. x

You must be well aware that for each video we upload there will have been a number of trial sessions beforehand. It may be that I haven’t made that dish for a while so need to iron out the pitfalls, or just to work out the main points I need to emphasise before we can share it with you all. This week was no exception. Our video was for Toad in the Hole, having had several requests to do this one. So dear reader, some weeks ago I decided to make a start. It wasn’t great but, remembering the old blackened tin and plenty of dripping my mother used, I had another go. It was better but I still wasn’t satisfied and so it took a third attempt to work out the detail. It paid off and there have already been over 600 views of the video in just 3 days, making an immediate entry into our top ten most popular dishes. Viewing figures and statistics make interesting reading and are sometimes surprising. I’ve learnt for myself that it’s always worth having another try if something doesn’t go right first time, so be heartened, practice makes perfect x

Social media recently reminded me that it’s a whole year since we met up with some old friends at a National Trust property midway between our homes. We had a lovely day, picnicing in the shade, strolling in the sunshine, admiring the flowers, commenting on the quality of the vegetables and remarking on the efficient plant labelling. Unfortunately the house was closed due to Covid but we wandered around, chatting about anything and everything, eventually finding ourselves on the lawn behind the house. An enormous shrubby tree loomed in front of us and I quickly realised it was a mulberry bush. You can guess our reaction! We walked around it (well some of us did!) singing the song and marveling at the vastness of the tree. There were very few people about so we hid ourselves among the branches to sample the fruits. Several mulberries later we emerged…a stained shirt and red fingers hidden…we went on our way thinking nobody would notice. Eventually as we returned to the car park, the lovely attendant asked if we’d enjoyed our visit and then added, ” And I see you found the mulberry!”……..Does this count as scrumping – at our age? x

Do you think there’s an office in the depths of government labelled “Bright Sparks Only” ? It must have been someone in this department who came up with the idea that we should gain credits by buying fruit and vegetables. All we need to do is download the aforementioned App onto our smart phones and we’re off, scanning our choices as we shop. There’s a slight hitch here – not everyone has a smart phone…and what about the people who “forget” to scan their unhealthy choices…? We really are going about this the wrong way. It’s through education that we will learn to make wiser choices. Downgrading the importance of Home Economics for all pupils and removing “A” level Food and Nutrition from schools was a massive error. Where are prospective food specialists (and even the parents of tomorrow) to gain their knowledge ? Organic Biochemistry was a module in my “A” level course, and fascinating it was too. All schools are now required to have some food-related teaching to the age of 14, but only a quarter of all junior schools achieve this, according to OFSTED. It seems that food teaching is currently left to enthusiasts and TA’s who might have been on a course or two (if they are lucky). Knowledge and experience counts for everything when each generation needs to learn, whatever the subject.

It is reassuring that so many of the shops in our little seaside town have continued to request that customers wear masks and use the hand sanitiser strategically placed by the entrance. There are many people who feel that the relaxation of restrictions has come too soon in this country, particularly while there are many young people who still haven’t had 2 doses of vaccine. Yesterday I was being “girl Friday” in a local shop and noticed that the only customers to enter without masks were visitors from a county nearly a hundred miles away. They confidently strode around un-sanitised and maskless. Should I have challenged them? The risk of abuse or argument was too great – they might have spent money with us, could I turn them away? I decided not to, but kept my distance and my mask on and will do so for the foreseeable future. My feeling is that the government has been too cavalier in continuing the path to normality by attempting to create herd immunity by stealth.

Where to begin? The latest report aiming to reduce obesity has been published and raises so many issues in my mind. The constant eating any time of day, anywhere; families not sitting at a table for meals; ultra processed food has become the norm; doctors are to prescribe fruit and vegetables as medecine……. what on earth has gone wrong with our diet? Lord Woolton did a wonderful job during World War 2 when the population was constrained by rationing but became so much healthier. There have been numerous attempts to address this crisis in the last 20 years but all have failed due to lack of government support and resistance from the food industry. Yet again a tax on salt and sugar will probably be vetoed. We need to understand what goes into our processed food and, generally speaking, if you don’t recognise an ingredient or can’t pronounce it’s name then it’s likely you don’t need to be eating that food. Improvements in the teaching of food studies in school would go a long way to helping the crisis, meanwhile we can all do our best to influence those around us and encourage their healthy eating habits. By the way, “The Value of Food” is a brilliant book written by Patty Fisher and Arnold Bender and it contains pretty much all anyone needs to know about nutrition and healthy eating. My edition is dated 1975, but it’s probably available somewhere !

The recipes that we upload onto the website and the videos we make are all dishes I have used in the past and feel would be useful to people of all ages. I make every effort to be clear about the ingredients and the methods, pointing out pitfalls too sometimes. I quite understand that pineapple on a pizza and cream in alfredo sauce will upset Italians, as we often heard this weekend! Many recipes are adapted for lots of reasons and I make no claims about total authenticity. Hopefully you didn’t see the horrible comment posted recently about a recipe – it was deleted quickly when the administrator saw it, as it contained inappropriate language, amongst other things. Sorry to rant, but that kind of “keyboard warrior” comment isn’t helpful when we are just doing our best. Bx

This week I was reminded by Facebook that it’s six years since I retired from teaching. I wondered what on earth I’d do with myself – would I become a lady who lunched? There had been opportunities in the past, when, without the required work permits, I’d enjoyed plenty of leisurely meals with lovely friends in both Italy and the U.S.A. Accompanying the captain of industry on a trip to Washington D.C. and North Carolina was the first retirement treat and later another to Miami, then supporting the work of Macmillan kept me busy. The last 16 months have been interesting – videos, website, blog…you know what I mean…but no lunches. This week has been quite a challenge though, waiting hours for an ambulance for a 98 year old, the early arrival of a poorly baby, stitching like crazy to finish a project and the central heating turning itself on in July ! Often the only support we can offer is a hug or a chat over lunch, but not now. So, at this very moment, there is Brownie in the oven to bring a smile to the face of a beleaguered friend x

After the torrential rain and flooding last weekend we were left with a double rainbow just hanging over the sea. Trying to take a picture with my phone wasn’t a great success but it was quite a sight to behold. It reminded me of one of my favourite phrases when teaching nutrition to young people – “Eat a rainbow”. It perfectly encompasses the value of all those vitamins supplied by foods of different colours. There was a summer holiday when I decided to make a (big) poster with each band of colour made up of tiny fruit and vegetable pictures. It was quite a labour of love but I was pleased with the result, even if the children took little notice of it as they passed by! More effective was the creation of a rainbow by arranging real foods on a bed sheet spread over the floor. We had such fun rolling lemons, oranges, limes, apples and sprouts across the floor. The blueberries, grapes and strawberries didn’t fare too well but the result was stunning. A much easier project than trying to cook with a whole year group in the school hall….but that’s another story!

It depends where you put the emphasis as to how you feel about this…. Right now we have a very dark evening and thunder rumbling overhead. I found myself saying to the cats – “It looks like rain in cherry blossom lane! “, am I the only person who recites poetry to animals…probably not. However June has not been kind to us in the far east of Suffolk. There was far too much rain for too long, then too much hot sun so that some plants rotted and others just didn’t take off. Most disappointing has been the asparagus – just a few spears early on and nothing since. There are some very impressive fields to the west of us and whilst I’ve never seen anyone cutting the spears (probably because they get up before me 😉 ) by the autumn there are swathes of fern swaying in the breeze. Just beautiful. I’ve found that one of the best ways to serve it is to roast it for 10 minutes – nestled between sausages or in a tray with olive oil and pepper. Delicious. Worth persevering for sure. Now the heavens have opened and we are inundated. So much for flaming June !