Food Glorious Baking

I love baking!  I don't just enjoy baking a few scones or a cake for someone's birthday, I LOVE baking the way people love football, or fashion, or Justin Bieber.

My baking passion began in my Nanna's kitchen where I would perch on a stool and watch every move my Nanna made.  I can't really remember exactly when I started baking myself, but I do remember that I started with Instant Pudding Biscuits.

For years my poor family were subjected to biscuits (cookies) make in every flavour of instant pudding you could buy.  These were normally a success but I am happy to admit that the Lime flavoured biscuits weren't the best idea.  My baking ability, under the amazing tuition of my Nanna, was at the expense of my little sister I fear - the advantage of being right-handed.  As I whipped up squares and loaves, my poor sister made an endless supply of wine biscuits iced together with sickly pink icing.  Poor love.

When Flo and I lived in Wellington, it was my ritual that every Sunday I would bake a batch of healthy bran muffins for lunches at work, then a 'treat' for home. The phrase "Torie, I'm just one man" was frequently heard. My kitchen was cute and full of cookbooks, and the perfect environment for baking (except for a rubbish oven).  I would don a pair of headphones, blast some terrible pop music and 'bake and shake' for an afternoon. Bliss!  A Saturday would often involve accompanying Flo to the library, and sitting reading 'Ladies a Plate' while he browsed the CDs. In fact, it was this book that renewed my craving for baking old school New Zealand recipes.

I read recipe books for pleasure, and have recently drooled over the glorious Sophie Dahl's food anecdotes.  I dream of room entirely devoted to recipe books, floor to ceiling.  I try to guess what is in dishes so that I can replicate them at home, and if I had to choose between a good drama and a cooking show, cooking would win hands-down.  Saying that, I'm not a huge lover of actually cooking.  It stresses me out all that juggling of times and ingredients.  I can watch Gordon Ramsey and to a point, Jamie Oliver, until the cows come home, but actually putting any of the recipes into practice - not bloody likely.  Baking is where it's at for me.


Living in Munich now, and seeing the end of my dissertation in sight (a week or two at most), I am trying to think of the best ways to fill the next four months until our little one arrives. I have been advised to read as many books as I can and go to as many restaurants as I can before we have a little person to factor in.  Well I have to admit, being vegetarian most of the time, I am not a huge fan of restaurants (risotto and cheese-based dishes just don't do it for me). Not one to sit down for too long (my Grandy's legacy) I have taken to the kitchen with a vengence.

Methods to my Madness:

My 'cup' measurement and chief mixing tool - the humble fork.

I've heard Nigella say that she can't bake.  I think that unless you are Alison Holst or some freak of nature, you are always a little better at one over the other.  I've also read that baking is an exact science, which is why many people can't be bothered with it.  In my case, this just doesn't ring true.  I am of the old school of baking.  I use simple tools (even more simple now that I am not in my own kitchen and my baking essentials are still in moving boxes), measure roughly and taste, taste, taste.  Most of my recipes are in ounces having inherited them from Nanna, and I use a fork over a wooden spoon or an electric beater.  But it works for me (at least most of the time).

A pre-baby project:

When I travel anywhere, I have one important item in my hand luggage - an almost ancient green ring-binder with 140-odd recipes, in my Nanna's handwriting.  It is my recipe bible and I have grown up flicking between the fruitcake recipe (recipe 138) and pink lady cake (recipe 30).



Ok, so I have four months (give or take) until Flo junior arrives.  I smell a project coming on....
Inspired by Julie and Julia (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1135503/) and missing my Grandparents who are on the other side of the world, I have decided to try each of my nanna's recipes, one-by-one.  Some of them - the aforementioned fruit cake - will remain a secret, but I plan to make then try, then blog, each one of the recipes.  There's no time frame per se, but I'll aim for as many as pre/post-baby time and German ingredients will allow in a year.  I have to admit I'm rather excited about trying Uncle Charlie's tablet again (a staple of Easter growing up) but the prospect of Hamslaw and Savoury Jelly are less than pleasant.

Please feel free to bake/cook along with me and wish me luck.

Torie