Can’t win ‘em all

Monday has become our favourite day for lunch because our once a week shopping regime means it’s the only day we get crispy crunchy bread.  And I love crispy crunchy fresh bread.

What makes it harder to bear is that we’re entering into fresh salad vegetable season and the two together are close to my ideal meal.

So, with a little gentle persuasion, we’ve dug our Panasonic bread making machine out of the cupboard, recharged our stock of raw materials, and the house is filling gently with the wonderful smell of fresh bread.  There’s nothing more homey than the smell of baking and of hot black coffee and this evening we got the lot.

Yummity.  Scrummity.

And, on much the same subject, I was given to a little schadenfreude at lunch time when the heavens opened and smashed us all with a truly grand hail storm.

“Well, that’s gratifying,” I said.

“How’s that, then?”

“If I’d given in to neighbourly persuasion I’d have planted out my veggie seedlings by now, and this lot would have hammered them into the ground.”

“Ah.  When we go out to buy your seedlings we’d better get some fleece, then.  Protect them from hail storms as well as greedy birdlings.”

“Good thinking, little nibble person.”

“You’ve got salad cream all down your front.”

“Can’t win ‘em all.”

10 Responses to Can’t win ‘em all

  1. Kate & Jim

    Ah – Cheesecloth! (fleece)

    I’ll have a generous slather of butter on my warm crispy bread, John. Thanks

  2. Unfortunately being raised in a bakery, where fresh bread was the daily indulgence, with or without the butter. It has left me with a lifelong craving of this delicacy….
    Maybe I should have said fortunately ;)
    Uumm I can almost smell your bread from here !

  3. Doggone it is pouring rain and I have no makings for the bread machine and you started something. :-)

  4. Mary Lee McClure

    I tried the break machine, several times, and found I much preferred my own, start from scratch, knead, rise, punch doewn, knead, rest, risee, punch, etc., i.e., the REALLY old-fashioned way. A pretty much all day affair, but soooo worth the effort and the waiting. And that yeasty fragrance all through the house. Glorious! A dab of unsalted butter, a bit of marmalade and a deep sigh of contentment and fulfillment! Join me? And would you have milk or lemon with your tea? I have some very nice water cress, too.

    Oh there’s no doubt that you have the right way there, Mary Lee! I’ll be on the next jet. Can I have my tea black, please?

  5. Oh Mary Lee, in case I’m also invited, well…, I’d love lemon with my tea, please! Thanks!

  6. Oh no, you’re not getting the bread machine out again? I remember last time you did that you induced enormous cravings for fresh bread in me every time you mentioned it! Now I can feel them coming on again… yum!

  7. yup, I need to dig out my bread maker too, thanks for the reminder John. I need to make pizza dough. Mmm, fresh pizza dough….

    You’ll have to plant some salad leaves in your veggie patch (sorry if you already said your going to, I’m tired)
    :)

    Graham has a veto on salad leaves, lou. He just doesn’t like ‘em. I’ll be growing little gem and cos lettuce, hopefully.

  8. You do know that bread freezes beautifully. I was given a coffee cake a couple of months ago. I finally finished the last bit last week. Just hacked off a slab, popped it into the microwave (or oven) for a minute and wow, tasty. I have done that with crusty breads too. Still crusty. Yum.

  9. John, I haven’t received a notify for several days.

    Is anyone else having this problem?

    Can’t see anything wrong with your membership record, Kate. Might be your ISP doing clever anti-spamming?

  10. By gum, great minds DO run in the same channel! I was walking by a bakery this morning just after they opened the ovens; that gorgeous smell was rolling out onto the sidewalk. I tried to walk on, I really did! Couldn’t do it…had to go back and buy a couple bags of whole wheat rolls. All my students loved them, and so did I.