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Good afternoon everybody,
It's a wet Wednesday as I write this, safely ensconsed on an upstairs table at Green Routes, a lively espresso doing it's work. At the bakery this morning the talk was of grinding spices. As you might imagine a fair amount of cinnamon quills and cardamom seeds (whole spices only) must be ground to powder every week and there's a growing feeling amongst the pastry team that we've outgrown relying on our trusty Nutribullet for this lengthy, noisy task. So what to do? Reach out to the network, of course. The overwhelming consensus from our industry contacts was to get a Thermomix. For the uninitiated, a Vorwerk Thermomix is a high-tech blender-come-food-precessor-come-cooker with a dizzying array of functions and a price tag to match. From our preliminary research, it seems like it would save us a lot of time, whilst also offering the simultaneously tantalising and remote prospect of becoming the sort of people that evangelise continuously about just how easy it is to make soups, stews, you literally just throw everything in and press a button etc etc ad infinitum. So, do we go the whole hog and buy a new one for the best part of two grand, on finance or otherwise? Or get a refurbished one from a trusted reseller for half the price? Or saddle up and enter the wild west of ebay and facebook marketplace where you might find a second hand Thermo', as they're affectionately known, for a mere three hundred quid?
You may need to wait until next time to discover where we plump, but I mention this seemingly trifling episode as it is, in its own little way, emblematic of the type of change that inevitably comes with eight years of running a bakery (yes, I'm still talking about our anniversary - when writing the official birthday email last week I hadn't, so to speak, had my espresso, and was feeling a little flat and not in the caffeinated, discursive not to say rambling mode in which you currently find me). Kate is of an admirably frugal nature, and from the very start was intent on running an extremely tight ship, wastage being anathema, every piece of equipment really needing to earn its keep, not to mention its space in the bakery. Why spend on a commercial food processor when a domestic Kenwood would do? Why pay for aprons and cloths to be laundered when there was space for a domestic washing machine in the back? This mindset undoubtedly helped us to traverse the choppy waters of our first few months, when custom was scarce and our bread seemed at times to befuddle as many people as it delighted (there's another whole newlsetter there, let me tell ya). But time goes by and dang it all things change. Our trusty Kenwood managed five years or so before we upgraded to a Robot Coupe, we still do our own laundry but we're on our third washer dryer, and now it seems the days of spices in the Nutribullet are well and truly numbered. Who knows where the time goes?
Harriet's highlights for the week ahead are as follows. As the days become more autumnal, we felt it was the perfect time for our gingerbread to return to the counter. Kate’s recipe takes inspiration from a traditional Grasmere gingerbread but with the addition of candied peel and marmalade for a little extra zing. We also have blackcurrant muffins on all week – try to catch one fresh from the oven – Chelsea buns packed with raisins and currants and pink-tinged apple tarts as a weekend special.
Our cheddar of choice this week is Pitchfork. Produced by Todd and Maugan Trethowan using raw milk from Holstein and Jersey cows, it is named after the pitchforks used to mix salt into the curds as part of the handmade production process. Savoury and nutty, this week’s batch is particularly creamy with a gentle tang and rounded finish. Elsewhere in the fridge we have a delightfully fudgy batch of Brightwell Ash and a few spruce boxes of oozy Vacherin from Switzerland. As a new addition we have also been tubbing some green Intosso olives from Abruzzo. Unpasteurised and cured in just a little brine, these unique olives grow only in the foothills of the Maiella mountain range. They are crunchy and buttery with an intense green fruit aroma and notes of cut grass. Perfect with a glass of lightly chilled Herbes Folles.
Thank you for reading,
Hugo and Kate
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