hot cross buns (whole grain baking)

While cleaning through my stored boxes in my parents' basement a couple of years ago I found this little book. My mother had found it at a thrift store and then tucked it into my boxes for me. It's a treasure. It has a selection of Easter breads from around the world, accompanied by charming line drawings, and background stories.

mushroom pizza on water chestnut flatbreads

This month's Fresh from the Oven challenge (hosted by Helen of Fuss Free Flavours) was to bake something with locally made flour. That proved to be quite a challenge for me, here in Hong Kong. However, after a long hunt, I found this water chestnut flour. How intriguing. What is this stuff?

kiflice, Serbian mini cheese rolls

November's Fresh from the Oven challenge was these inventive cheese rolls called kiflice, from Serbia. Chosen by Maja from Cooks and Bakes, they are a yeasted mini bun that encloses a cottage cheese filling. For my version, I made a whole wheat dough and used onion and chive cottage cheese for the filling. The buns are glazed with milk and egg yolk, and, just for more shiny goodness, the baking pan is covered in dots of margerine. All this makes for a rich, cheesy snack.

Chelsea buns

Chelsea buns are a new idea for me--and a tasty one! Similar to cinnamon rolls, they enclose a buttery, sweet filling. Instead of cinnamon they are studded with dried fruit--I used raisins and dried figs. Chelsea buns were this month's Fresh From the Oven challenge, set by Wendy of Notes from the Quirky Kitchen. They sound scrumptious, don't they? My Chelsea buns, though, were a disaster.

cornmeal and pine nut bread

1. How can you transform any normally distributed random variable into the Standard Normal Distribution?
2. How has the pace been this week?
3. What is your foremost question or concern?


About once a week I ask my upper school students for some feedback using an activity called The Two Minute Drill, which I learned from an inspirational teacher several years ago. I give out small pieces of paper and ask three questions to gain feedback anonymously. The first question is always one that helps me assess whether students have understood what I've been teaching. The second asks them for some feedback on my teaching. And the third question is always the same: any concerns?

brioche (for Fresh from the Oven)--and a Croque Monsieur sandwich

This month's new bread to try was brioche, the Fresh from the Oven challenge. Brioche is so egg- and butter-rich that you can smell the deep yellow goodness as soon as they come out of the oven. Chele from Chocolate Teapot chose this delicious bread as our monthly challenge.

whole wheat walnut bread (for Fresh from the Oven)

I've learned so much since joining the bread baking group Fresh from the Oven. The monthly challenges have boosted my skills--and confidence with bread. It's my pleasure to host July's Fresh from the Oven challenge.

Turkish pide (for Fresh from the Oven)

This delicious bread was the selection of Mrs Ergul for the June challenge of Fresh from the Oven, a baking group that has helped me stretch my skills with bread.


I added some aubergine dip (baba ganoush), sweet potato spread, and tomato chilli jam to the table, and we had a mezze-style meal with some friends.

pizza nepoletana (for Fresh from the Oven)

My mother often makes pizza when guests come over. I decided to follow suit as we had some new friends visiting for dinner and to watch the Formula One. The dough recipe is part of the Fresh from the Oven baking group that Lauren from Coffee Muffins hosted this month. Have a look at the round up from the challenge.


I used my dough recipe to make one large pizza and one tray of garlic bread. The dough was fluffy but not too heavy, and it made great bases for both the pizza and garlic bread. The recipe starts the night before, and rests in the fridge overnight. Then it rises and gets pressed onto the pans. There's no kneading, just some heavy mixing on the first day. Overall the dough was simple to make and didn't require much preparation time at all. We topped it with tomato puree, sweetcorn, mushrooms, courgettes, green peppers, caramelised onions, and mozzarella.

I would definitely make pizza dough again. Next time I plan to use some whole wheat flour as well. I remember reading a few years ago about a fast version that uses soda instead of yeast, and I want to try that as well. So all I need to do is keep inviting people over so that we can keep eating pizza!

no-knead bread (for Fresh From the Oven)

I'm so proud to be part of a baking group called Fresh from the Oven. It's a group of bakers looking to try new things and each month we choose a bread baking project. This seems to suit me just fine, since I'm a beginner when it comes to bread. For February's challenge we are all making Jim Lahey's No-Knead Bread. Claire from Things We Make chose this great recipe.


I asked for Jim Lahey's book for Christmas (My Bread: The Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method) and I've made the No-Knead Bread several times now. It's been much talked about on the websites and blogs, since it was first written about by Mark Bittman for the New York Times (and the extremely simple recipe is found in the article). Bloggers everywhere have written about it. So I figured it might be time to learn how to make bread and also try the recipe that has been so much talked about. I have tried it as a white rustic loaf, a wholewheat loaf, and a rye loaf (below), which was my favourite.


What makes this bread recipe unique is that there is no kneading, instead the wet dough has a very long (twelve to eighteen hour) first rise. I've made it once with a 24 hour rise (in a cool place) and it was delicious. (It's a very flexible recipe, and forgiving.) Then after a two hour second rise it gets baked inside a covered pot in the oven. This means the bread is steamed in "the oven inside the oven". The resulting loaf is hard crusted but with lots of porous holes inside the fluffy bread.


Making the bread is definitely easier than any I have tried before. And timing it has been relatively easy as well. If I want to use it for a lunch or early afternoon, I mix it the night before and let if rise overnight. If I want to use it in the evening, I mix it at breakfast time (since I get up so early there are more than 12 hours between breakfast and dinner!). One night the bread was just ready at dinner time and we were so tired that we ended up just eating warm bread with oil, vinegar, and cheese as a meal. It was fantastic!