Sunday 6 January 2013

Home-baked January; a slow start!

The first week of my baking challenge has been a bit of a phony war! I had a bit of a stockpile of cake and bread to use up, as it would be a bit of a false economy to let them go stale. However, we have now finished all the cake and I am down to the last loaf of bread.

Bread will be our biggest issue. I think that I, (OK - the breadmaker!), will probably need to produce a loaf of bread every morning, and have some rolls in the freezer for the children's lunches. Fresh bread doesn't tend to last much past breakfast! I have baked some parmesan rolls to stock up the freezer as I had some quasi-parmesan in the fridge. I am going to tweak this recipe to use normal/cheaper cheese and will blog it if it is any good.
 

I have also made a kind of mocha chocolate sponge. I baked a recipe using six eggs so I used my Kenwood Chef which originally belonged to my Mother-in-Law.


I love it because I know that it has been used to bake countless cakes, including many enjoyed by DH when he was small. It has a very on-trend retro look and it also does the job beautifully. I made four sponges, froze two and filled two with chocolate butter icing. The mocha cake had mixed reviews; DD thought it needed more coffee, DS thought it had too much! You can't please all the people...DH maintained a diplomatic silence!


I have also stocked up on biscuits. I used the hob-nob recipe which Morgan kindly gave me the link to. The recipe is supposed to be for 20 cookies, but I doubled up the quantities and made 88, so some maths has gone awry somewhere. I should have enough to keep us going for a while anyway!


We have also made flapjack, gingerbread men (from a Christmas kit), plum tarts (least said, soonest mended) and tiffin. I know that for many people this is a normal way of life, and you are probably wondering what I am making such a fuss about! For me it feels like a natural progression, but the real test will start next week as the kids go back to school and normal routines resume.

4 comments:

  1. You've been busy baking! One of my goals for 2013 is to bake all our breads (except for flour/corn tortillas which I still haven't mastered). I am trying to decide whether I want to bake a week's worth at once or bake every two days. The bread seems to be going faster than I planned on.

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  2. You've have started off with a bang there! Well done. I have a Kenwood Chef exactly like yours, and probably of a similar vintage as my aunt and my mum had one each; my sister got my mum's and I got my aunt's. It makes great bread, too.

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  3. It is good to see the old Kenwood mixer having a new lease of life, and feeding that little boy's offspring. Well done, Lesley.

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  4. That hobnob recipe IS great. We found a liquidiser goblet in a charity shop which fits my vintage Chef beautifully. Even more soups to be made!]

    But not sponge cakes, in view of expanding waist line

    happy new year!!

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