Coming soon

Basic Bread Making

How awful is this weather, instead of sun bathing I've been baking, last week it was cakes, today I decided to make some bread.

Now normally I just use the bread maker and often prepared mixes from Lidl, today I wanted to make some bread rolls.

You can use a mixer with a bread hook or as I did I used the bread maker to mix the dough, so in this order you need.

300ml of cold water

10g Salt

500gm bread flour

2 satchets Levure boulangére (dried yeast)

Mix the ingredients together, then place onto a floured surface and knead well.

Put the dough in a bowl, cover and leave in a warm place, guard dog is optional.

Leave till it doubles in size.

Knock it back on a floured surface.

Put the dough in a tin, or make into bread rolls or a long baguette and put on lightly greased paper or a baking tray, if your doing rolls make sure you leave plenty of room around them.

Like this.

Cover with a clean cloth then put them back in a warm place to double again.

Put them into the oven at 200C till golden brown, about 20mins

Guard dog still optional.

For a loaf like this use the same ingredients but only one satchet of levure, bake in your bread maker on the FRENCH setting.

PERFECT YORKSHIRE PUDDINGS
For 8

1 mug of flour
pinch of salt
1 mug full of eggs (beaten)
Half mug of water, add a little more if needed.

Mix together and let it rest for 30 mins.
Put a little very hot oil from your roast in a non stick tin,either a large one or small ones like these, if you want add sausage.

To making perfect puddings you need;
Very hot oil,
a well rested mix
and a clean oven glass so you see if they are cooked without opening the door.

Cook at 220 - 230c
till brown about 30 mins.

If your baking a large pudding you need to cook it darker and crispier than these otherwise it may collapse when you take it out of the oven.

Finished (nearly)

Still got the outside electrics to finish, Pauls put the outside light up but has the electric sockets to put on the outside, a couple more coping stones to go on the top of the wall but apart from that the extensions finished and the patio is laid.

Flower festival in La Gacilly

Yesterday was the flower festival in La Gacilly, also on was the start of the photo exhibition, I also took a quick walk round the camp site.

The rest of my photographs are

HERE

I'm also nicking photographs from friends which I will add later.

 

Bit of a surprise

Just took a walk round my veg patch, look what I found.

It wasn't there yesterday.

Jubilee celebrations

Mike and Lynn at La Gacilly day boats organised a picnic to celebrate the Queens Jubilee down by the river, the turn out was pretty good considering the weather conditions the days proceeding it and the morning itself, but the sun came out so quite a few people attended, after lunch we hired out one of the boats for a couple of hours and had a cruise down the river Aff.

I love having my family together, I'm so fortunate that they are all here in France with me.

We all had a go at driving the boat

""Take me to Cuba"

All the photographs can be seen HERE
and to find out more about La Gacilly day boats go HERE

Summer food

I love this time of year , no more stews or soups, winter is about winter warming foods, food that makes you feel good on a cold dark winters evening, but now the summer is here and now its about taste and colour. Using produce fresh from the garden and each week having something new ready to pick. 

In the garden now I have 3 types of lettuce, strawberries and radish, add melon and ham, the sweet melon and the strawberries, the salty ham, peppery lettuce drizzled with extra virgin olive oil, and crunchy radish.

Cold pork with apple

Buffalo Mozzarella, tomatoes and spring onion.

Slice everything up, sprinkle with Basil and pour on olive oil and leave in the fridge for an hour.

Serve any of the recipes with a medium Rosé or a Kir made from Muscadet, its what summers are made for.

This is the life

Not one of my normal photograph posts, I thought I might say something, although I'm sure I will add the odd photograph along the way. Paul's been on holiday this week, we were supposed to be going to the UK for a few days but the building of the extension has taken longer than we thought, its not easy for Paul to motivate himself after getting up at 3am driving 75km to work, doing a very hard days work then driving 75 km home,

Then with a week off the sun starts shining, to hot to work outside, our lawnmower is in the work shop so Paul had to use his petrol strimmer to keep the grass down, wearing a mask in this heat was not fun,so of course a beer is needed, then you can  forget work. But the insides finished(ish), it could do  with another coat of paint but for now I'm happy with it.
One of the jobs that was supposed to be done this week was the outside rendering, but Paul was relying on some help, unfortunately the helps not available till next week, the person who is helping render the house has been busy on his own house, removing the render. Next job is the patio, a friend has made the slabs and as soon as the rendering is done and they can be delivered (there only over the valley) and laid, I'm so looking forward to this.
Paul's in charge of the veg and I the plants, although I get Paul to water my plants for me when he goes to water his veg, Its great having a well, apart from a little electricity for the pump its free water, it is drinkable as well, I would love to get it pumped into the house but today it is drinkable tomorrow it may not be, I would have to keep getting tests done, but it would be nice to have it for the toilet and washing machine but were not sure its worth the cost of putting it in, I suppose if a new house was being built it might be economical, but I'm not sure if it would be now. Talking of new houses, although theres not going to be one, did I mention that we have Certificate du Urbanisme for our other piece of land, we wont build on it and its not for sale, but now it could be built on, before it was a piece of agricultural land worth not a lot to a 1000sqm building plot Value about €25,000, as I said not for sale, if I did sell I would want to sell every thing but I doubt I could be tempted till Paul retires,
I did say this was going to be written post rather than my usual photo blog, but I just stopped writing to take some photographs, so back in a minute.



Ok I'm back, just been for a stroll round the garden, I should have bought more strawberry plants and put them in the ground, next year definately, but for now the few I'm growing in bags have been very tasty but not enough to pick a lot so I tend to eat thm when I see them.

The veg, after a shaky start, I put them in to early, are looking good, its a shame Paul can't remember what he planted until they take shape.

 But even with this blurred photo I can see these are onions.

Yep lettuce

Cauliflower

Mostly sprouts, except for this plant at the front that is a root veg, a bit like a potato.

 Celiriac

 Tomatoes, Pauls got these in bags and in the ground, most looked a bit dead a few weeks back and we did lose a couple but the rest are starting to shrive.

Usually I can't buy turkeys till about July but I was in La Gacilly on market day and the pulrty man had some white turkeys in, I bought a couple, meet Christmas and Easter.

Unless of course they should turn out to be Male and female then the y may survive the cull, I have been thinking of getting a couple more, but may save the room for the bronze turkeys later in the year.

3 Males, 2 females and 24 eggs in 2 nests, result I Gosling.

The duck saw more action with the girls this year so I think the 2 white geese could very soon be dinner.

We have a grape vine in the garden, the fruit is usually very small and sour so Paul took his cutters to it, hopefully this year we will get better grapes.

And with no competition from the bantam chickens we are looking forward to a bumper year from the cherry tree.

In line with our house is a big mettle barn, we ae screening it with bamboo, I thought it would take a long time to do its job but the speed its growing it may not take as long as I thought, It will start spreading soon, thats why Paul now has his strimmer, but at the momment its growing about 6 - 10cm a day.

And I thought I might post a few photos from the bottom of the garden, across the valley.

 Note Pauls veg beds, its a lot easier to use this method than fill a whole field with produce.

Time for a drink, I may be back.

Caption competition

Mr "Taste of Garlic" Keef, whats the caption?

Finished

Well the inside is, hopefully a few dry days and the outside can be rendered.

My first ever visit to an Ikea.

Pauls says thats the easiest flat pack furniture he's ever done.

And relax