Saturday 25 August 2012

My Favourite Telly Program. . .

Tuesday night, my Liverpud and I are stuck to the settee watching The Great British Bake Off.  It's such a wonderful and refreshing reality cooking show, trying to find the best amateur baker in the U.K.  I really like the fact that the focus is on the baking - both sweet and savoury - and the contestants have been chosen because they all really enjoy cooking, and not because they are nasty and would make good television. There's a range of ages and backgrounds, but all of them are so nice and inventive that you find yourself rooting for all of them and gutted when one gets into trouble.  The judges - Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood - are critical but not mean.  And you get tons of good baking tips. 
I immediately went out and bought the accompanying cookbook, the Great British Bake Off: How to Turn Everyday Bakes into Showstoppers by Linda Collister (it's a bit strange that it's come out before the end of this season so you do get a bit of a preview of the challenges to come, although no spoilers are given in terms of the winner).  It's quickly become one of my favourite cookbooks - there are SO many recipes I want to try.  This show is really inspiring.  This week's episode focused on flatbreads - the contestants had to come up with both savoury and sweet ones, and the flavour combinations they concocted had my mouth watering.  So I gave making homemade naan a try, adding lime and coriander.  It wasn't perfect - it could have used more seasoning and the dough was a bit thicker than I would have liked, but still never having done any kind of bread baking before, I was quite chuffed with the results.


Liverpool is hosting a Food and Drink Festival at the beginning of September which I'm really excited about. Paul Hollywood will be attending (he's originally from the Wirral) and judging a Merseyside Bake Off and there will also be a chef demonstrating Malaysian cooking, lots of beer and wine tasting and something called a Heavenly Chocolate Garden.  Can't wait!

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