Just when you think you've come up with a good idea!

In my last post, I suggested that 2016 should be the Year of Cooking from Scratch. Today I found out that some "tin-pot" organisation called the United Nations (whatever that means) has decided that 2016 is the International year of the Pulse! My idea has been trumped!
On a serious note, the humble pulse in all its forms is a great food stuff and may well be the most ethical source of protein on earth. The dowdy image of the pulse probably stems from the rather grim lentil soups may of us faced in our youth, the truth is the range of pulses and the range of cooking methods mean that pulses can really stand, on their own as a central item on the menu.
Who could not be moved by the smooth and spicy draw of a dhal, or the sweet joy of peas popped from the pod into the mouth five seconds after picking. For me, the king of the pulses is the Broad Bean, I look forward to this seasonal treat with the same excitement that I look forward to asparagus, strawberries and plums.
I am still going to continue with my mini campaign for Cooking from Scratch but I will claim extra points, this year, when I cook from scratch using pulses. In some strange ironic twist, I discovered the fact that this was The International Year of the Pulse this morning having served Duck legs on a bed of Puy lentils with a redcurrant gravy last night!
Please take a visit to http://iyp2016.org 

Roast duck leg on a bed of Puy lentils with redcurrant gravy

But it takes so long!

The ingredients ready to go - I love this moment

When I tell people that I make my own bread they often seem a little confused. "How do you find the time?" they ask. The truth is I live a very busy life but making bread does not take a lot of time at all. The active time to make the bread I made today was about 30 minutes. The problem comes when you take into account that those thirty minutes were spread over a three hour period.
Today's loaves were seeded bloomers. I simply added 120gms of a mixture of linseeds, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds to my standard white bread recipe and let the yeast do the rest!

Dough brought together and kneaded.

Upon tasting I think my next batch will have either some rye or some wholemeal flower in them. Writing new recipes is, after all a work in progress. Anyone who is reading this by accident or because my slightly weird evangelical zeal for food made from scratch, needs to make their own bread. Your house will smell like a dream and your loved ones will never let you buy a cheap plastic wrapped loaf again!

Ready for the oven.

These two loaves came in at about £1.20 each. They would be about 40p less if one removed the seeds from the recipe. (It is worth noting that additional flavours and textures: seeds, nuts, dried fruit, etc. add a great deal to the costs). Get baking people!

Out of the oven and cooling.

Happy New Year!

This post may come as a bit of a surprise to those of you who thought I had stopped writing this blog but I'm back! Further to this I'm also now tweeting so in due course I shall try to link my twitter account to this blog and bring the whole thing together! For the mean time I am MarkBond@cornetcotcook for those of you who also tweet.
Barely a day, week or year goes past without being given some purpose: Word Aids Day, Anti Bullying Week, and now the Pope has declared this year the Year of Mercy. At the risk of upsetting the Holy Father, I would like to suggest (quite respectfully) that we make this year the Year of Cooking From Scratch. It is high time we took back control of what goes into our food and the best way of doing this is to start with raw, base ingredients and make our food from scratch. I am not suggesting some kind of self sufficiency with everyone raising a few pigs and chickens as we need to be realistic. Sourcing our ingredients well must be a priority and then treating them with the respect they deserve.
People work hard to produce and grow food, often with paltry financial rewards, isn't it about time we made the effort to make the most of every single ingredient? Photos of my first bake of '16 to follow.