Becky Bakes…

… this time from a trip to the “frozen north”. It was a bit chilly to be honest considering it’s early June, but it didn’t stop us from having a lovely time. We had lunch at a pub by the river Dee, which was recommended to us by a cheerful antique dealer, but enjoyed long dinners with plenty of conversation (and wine) and plenty of reminiscences over the last 29 years. Homemade lasagne, brownie, baked salmon and lemon bakewell all went down well, but it was a little chap of two and a bit who stole the show. He was very proud of his daddy’s cows who were being milked and that’s his preferred drink, also helping feed Rupert the horse. He’s handy with a hosepipe too, but his aim isn’t always great, watering the windows instead of the plants… A side trip on the way home meant fruit cake and pecan pie with a much-needed cup of tea with two lovely buddies too. Phew. Back to normal now ! x

This weather is such a trial. Whilst we’ve had some lovely days with warm sunshine, we seem to have had more than our fair share of rain and chill. I have to confess that our central heating clicked in last night and I enjoyed the warm toastie feeling so much that we let it happen again this evening. It does mean that the garden is very green and the new flower bed, where our pond used to be, is flourishing. I resisted buying many new plants, just emptying pots of hellebores and acers which had seen better days. Apparently the turf has already rooted well so the lawn was cut yesterday before the rains came again. Roll on summer!

During the course of the week I like to keep an eye on my website homepage, not only looking at what’s been downloaded and which country views have come from, but also to see if there’s a red dot in the top right hand corner. This means that someone has made a comment and in the past we’ve had all sorts, ranging from lovely to nasty with rude and lewd thrown in for good measure. The unpleasant ones are deleted as soon as we see them and the lovely ones can stay. Recently we had a strange one on You tube – you might have spotted it – it was on the Chicken Crumble video. Someone, not in the UK, had complained that my dish (which I’ve been making for 35 years) has the same name as an animal foodstuff that he was searching for. Why on earth did he click on Becky Bakes? Does it sound like a farming supplier? Well dear reader, I think that’s just a bit weird, do you? 😉

I’d planned to tell you about our soggy Tuesday Trip to Woodbridge but so much has happened. There have been several food recalls due to contamination by bacteria in one case and glass in another. Add to that the situation in Devon with water unfit to drink, yet those affected were told to drink more… So here we are. Excess cauliflower leafage is being turned into packaging which will rot down and Morrisons are backing this project to reduce plastic waste. How have we reached the point where food consumption is fraught with so many complications? Tonight we found our avocado came from Peru, but our salad leaves were from the greenhouse just outside the back door. We should try to eat seasonally and locally, that way we reduce airmiles and plastic as well as hygiene risks. x

Listening to a podcast this week doctor Michael Mosely suggested that by changing just one thing in our lifestyle we can greatly improve our health. His suggestion that day was that we should cook from scratch more often than we currently do. Not only would that reduce the quantity of ultra processed foods that we eat but it would also improve our mental health as well as our nutritional intake. It goes without saying that commercially produced dishes with ingredient lists of items not found in our cupboards are going to be less beneficial than recognisable ones. But simply preparing a dish also means that we tend to consume more fruits and veg which can’t be bad. Tonight we’ve made fish parcels and roasted asparagus at the same time. Delicious !

Do we take enough notice of warnings concerning food products I wonder? Do we even see them? This week Waitrose recalled their own brand “salted dairy butter”. There was a small notice in their free weekly newspaper, placed just next to the crossword, near the back and very easily missed. Apparently there is the potential presence of blue cloth – does this mean someone dropped a J-cloth in the churn perhaps? There are often recalls of food products and I think they should be more widely publicised. Social media doesn’t reach everyone, so let’s see better communication of issues with our food please.

That’s a favourite phrase – it means we’ve been away. I never announce it beforehand, who wants everyone to know their house is empty? Well, we went to north Norfolk. It’s a county we like and at one time thought of moving there. We have some young friends who live near Norwich so visit quite often but this time we stayed longer. Lunch in Holt followed by a steam train ride (in the rain) was great fun. Passing the golf course, I couldn’t resist waving to the soggy players and they waved back vigorously – I’m sure they do it all the time and get fed up with tourists, but who knows? Our hotel had been chosen for us and it was very good. An interesting building with a view of the sea and surrounded by National Trust woodland, bliss. The food was delicious so we ate too much of course, but who could resist vanilla creme brulee? So a stroll around Blickling Hall was just what we needed, marvelling at the decor and textiles, unable to ignore the plants for sale…We returned with a full boot (trunk), lovely photos and a desire to go back x

Having always tried to put some distance between work (school) and home, it’s rare that I bump into an ex-pupil. Quite often they are keen to leave sleepy Suffolk, whether it’s to go to college or university, or the excitement of the big city. But this week I spotted a familiar face striding down our main street but was too slow to catch her. On her return I was ready! What a treat to catch up and chat about old times – learning that even now she brings out her year 6 red folder when she wants to cook. Hopefully she’s found several more reliable recipes to expand her repertoire having had my business card pressed into her hand ! We’ll see 😉

Earlier this week I was asked to comment on the news that the National Trust had announced that their scones were made with margarine, so therefore, vegan friendly. Well, to be honest, my scones and the hundreds (maybe thousands) made in my classrooms over the years have always been made with margarine. Butter would create too much flavour and that’s not needed with scones as they are a vehicle for stronger flavours themselves. We typically spread butter or cream and jam on them, so they don’t need a strong tasting matrix. This whole argument has been labelled as “woke” but really all the National Trust are doing is conforming to labelling requirements, nothing has changed, just the information that’s required is now front and central. I don’t want to even mention the cream-or- jam- first debate. 😉

It’s been an interesting week. As an administrator of my website I can see which recipes are being researched and also where in the world the views are coming from. This week we’ve pretty much spanned the globe, hopefully helping people with reliable recipes for home or school use. I can do something similar with Youtube too, checking the number of views each week. It’s interesting that Fork Biscuits are still leading with Cheese and Onion Soda Bread closely following. We’ve had nearly forty thousand views altogether on the ninety videos, which is amazing. So, thanks ! I’ll keep going for a bit longer 😉