Resurrecting Veronica

A few Sundays ago now, I woke up with this real strong urge to bake some bread. Which is unusual because normally my initial urge upon waking is to pass some vehement form of wind. After which I'll squint at the clock, roll over, pull the duvet over my head and gently prod my wife in the back because the kids are screaming from their cots, wanting to go downstairs. But on this particular day, the compulsion to knead dough and fill the kitchen with heavenly smells that soothe the nostrils rather than offend took precedent. As I am often in the habit of making bold declarations, my announcement to the household that I intended to bake kind of fell on deaf ears. The twins were far too engrossed by the antics of Mr Tumble, shoveling bananas into their little mouths and Mrs FU was dozily fumbling around with the coffee machine. So I jumped onto Twitter in the vain hope that out least one person out there would be interested in my plans. Almost immediately, Marky Market, the man who gets you meat, fish, whatever, tweeted a recipe link for an easy white loaf technique that seemed to be too easy to be true. OK so the recipe came from the Reverend of the Leaven himself, Dan Lepard but the notion of knocking up some dough and then giving it just a few quick 10 second bursts of kneading and then leaving it to prove didn't make any sense. The computer said no. Was it really that simple? The chorus from Twitter seemed to suggest it was and even Dan himself got in on the act with a communique that had a tone of "yes it does bloody work, just do it!"


So I did. I followed his instruction to the tee and blow me down, it worked. After very little effort I was rewarded with a simple but very tasty loaf of bread. And furthermore, it has lit a spark in me to do some more baking and I've knocked a fair few of them out since, ahem. I would love to get to a point where we eat nothing but home baked bread but alas time constraints of hectic family life don't allow it, even with a recipe as easy this. We still make visits to the supermarket to buy additive laden, plastic wrapped monster bread which does pain me but what can I do when tiny mouths scream "Toast Daddy! Want more toast!". Unless Dan Lepard can come up with an ingenious 30 second, all in, absolutely no messing about, bang, crash, whallop loaf. It would be great if he does.

However, something else has been weighing more heavily on my mind recently but still all connected to themes of baking, paternal duty, time and neglect. And that is the current state of my sourdough starter 'Veronica'. She is not looking good. Given the initial effort I put into making her and the ensuing fanfare on discovering that she actually worked, it's fairly disgraceful that Veronica has been left on the shelf at the back of the fridge, stewing in her own hooch. Actually before you get the RSPCS (Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Starters) onto me, I have been using her quite regularly to bake sourdough and feeding her, she hasn't been totally abandoned. But I must admit, the last time I took her out of the fridge for refreshing was possibly.......erm......ah...well let's see............er 4 months ago? On previous occasions, all it took was some pouring off, some fresh flour and water, a warm area, a repetition of the exercise a few times and boom, she would spring back into life. This morning however, looking at her listless, palid surface and her body, a slightly purplish, bloated mass of sodden gloop, Veronica now resembles some curious alien specimen, pickled in a Victorian jar. Is this the end? Have I in fact.......gulp.....killed her? God save my soul if I have but if anyone out there has any ideas on how to bring her back to life then I shall be indebited to you forever.

Help me Dan Kanobi, you're my only hope.

Dan Lepard's Easy White Loaf

Healthy Veronica

Unwell Veronica

I've killed her dammit *sob* I've killed her.........................hey neat chopping board

Houston, we have a problem

Holy Mother of God! WHAT IS THAT SMELL?

Hmm, this doesn't look good and doesn't come anywhere near to smelling good either. The last time I encountered such an aroma was when I eventually peeled off my socks and boots after a 5 day stint at a particularly damp Glastonbury. That tour of duty resulted in trench foot and such was the stench, I had to stick my feet out of the car window for the entire 4 hour journey home and I can tell you, it took a good while after that to nurse them back to fragrant health. The source of the offending funk this time however is coming from my sourdough starter. Like I said this doesn't look good.

So have I gone wrong somewhere? Well at this stage, it's hard to say. The recipe implicitly says that I had to wrap the grapes in muslin and submerge in flour and dough and leave for 2 weeks. It does indeed say that after such time the mixture will smell slightly unpleasant and have a pink tinge to it. Apparently it is at this point that you can begin to 'feed' it but the tears streaming from my eyes are prompting me to have doubts especially as the starter is only 7 days old.

Before taking any action, I decided to ask some searching questions on a foodie message board and the resulting answers has thrown a multitude of spanners in the works. There's a lot of people out there who seem to really know their stuff and now I am beginning to admit to myself that this whole business of making your own starter demands a lot more respect than I gave it in the first place. The amount of information given is quite dizzying but there seems to be two factors. The first bone of contention is that I have left the mix for too long before feeding it to encourage the natural yeasts to develop, and secondly the quantities of flour and water I've used are far too much. Most of the posted methods take smaller amounts, in which you generally begin the feeding process after 24 hours. After a period of 5 days of feeding you should get a nice yeasty smelling, bubbling mix that you can contain within a jam jar. I have a big bowl of lifeless grey sludge that's covered with murky brown water and smells like the cat has shit in it.

So where do I go from here? Maybe I should try and call Mr and Mrs Sam Clark and quiz them but it's unlikely that I'll get through to them at Exmouth Market HQ. Maybe I should just plough on and proceed as instructed. Or maybe I should just chuck it all away and start again. The one saving grace has come from one foodie advisor who has suggested that the brownish liquid could in fact with time turn to alcohol. And that could open up a whole new world of possibilities!

Sir it's only wafer thin

If I think about it, kicking off this blog with a title such as "Projects Mayhem Parts 1 and 2" is a bit of a misnomer. It implies that I'm embarking on some kind of audacious adventure where I shall be pushing culinary boundaries, breaking down walls, taking myself out of the comfort zone and promoting an effort to be truly epicurious.

However, on reflection perhaps I should have kicked off with "Project Sitting On My Arse and Look In The Fridge From Time To Time" as that is what I have basically done for the last few days. Although I look a bit like him (shaved head-check, angular glasses-check, er thats it) it doesn't really make me out to be the new Heston does it.

Maybe I am being a little too hard on myself here as the Duck Bresaola turned out very well, a little bit on the salty side but overall, the flavours of the star anise, coriander seed and zest came through. In fairness, I left the duck breasts in the cure slightly longer than I should have done before rinsing them off and air-drying in the fridge for two more days, which I think may account for the saltiness but if I'd had something like this, well that may have made all the difference. I sharpened my trusty Global as best as I could but couldn't quite get the delicate paper thin slices that I wanted. Yet, having served it up with some lamb's lettuce, drizzled with walnut oil and lemon juice, one of my test subjects remarked that it reminded her of parma ham so perhaps I wasn't that far off after all. Will definitely have a crack at this again as it would make a good stress free starter for a dinner party, though if only watching the fridge wasn't so boring.

No F*** off, I'm full!