Hels' Bakehouse Annual Review

So this week see's the first birthday of Hels' Bakehouse, and what a year it has been. I've baked over 1200 loaves and made an awful of a lot of granola in my little home oven. I've also made some great friends along the way. The high points include the Hot cross bun pop up shop, baking with the Strathblane Guides, the bread demonstration at Edenmill Food Festival, monthly fun at Killearn country market and spreading the Real Bread message of 'true loaf'' throughout the local community.  There have been lows too; realising I hadn't got enough ingredients at four in the morning (several times), nearly burning the house down when I fell asleep in a bread coma, attempting to bake sourdough in a heatwave...

It's all been great though. I've learnt a lot and I've loved every minute.

So what now?

Well, I'm taking a break from farmers markets for a little while and concentrating on getting more beauty sleep, indulging in my other passion for yoga through my alter ego of MLH Yoga, and passing on my love of baking to others with 'Bread courses from Hels'. The first 'Introduction to Bread Making' course runs on Monday 17th February at Killearn Village Hall, with a Sourdough course scheduled for the 31st March and Italian breads on the 28th April.  The Bread Club continues to be very popular, and I'll be working on some new recipes to keep my bread clubbers hungry for their weekly loaf, whilst bringing back some old favourites from the past year.  As part of my birthday celebrations I asked the bread club members to let me know what these were and promised to make some of them again over the next month. Here's the list so far:

Potato & Rosemary

Apple & cider

Fig & fennel

Chollah

Beer bread

Orange & mint

Sage & Onion

Malted brown

Rye & Raisin

Spelt & honey

Cheese & apple

Poppy seed

Looks like I am going to be busy, and I wouldn't have it any other way! Thanks to everyone for your support over the last year, it has been a pleasure baking for you.

Hels xx

It's time to get Festive!

This blog post is a mission statement, advert and general catch all communication for anyone who is interested in what Hels' Bakehouse is up to for Christmas!

I'm not normally one for planning ahead, but it occurred to me that as a business owner I might be expected to be more organised this year. So here's the plan:

1st December - 2pm Bread making demo at Edenmill Food Festival. Come along and find out how to make great Real Bread and test some of our favourite loaves. Then pay a visit to Santa and buy some great local produce!

A selection of breads and Christmas gift jars of festive granhohohola will be on sale at:

7th December - Strathblane Primary School Christmas Fair (6.30-9.00pm)

14th December - Killearn Christmas Market (10am-3pm)

The last Bread Club day of the year will be on Friday 20th December but I'll also be doing some special extra baking days on the 22nd & 23rd December.  These are open to all and you will be able to pre-order the following delicious Christmas treats from me for collection only:

Apricot & Walnut Couronne - a very special Christmas showstopper, filled with marzipan, apricots and nuts and finished with a sticky icing.  £8.50

Pain de Glengoyne - Whisky soaked raisins in delicious malty rye bread. Bye bye Miss American Pie, those good old boys would like this one with some thick cut marmalade for a very merry breakfast. £4.00

Cranberry & Pecan bread - a Bakehouse thanksgiving special. Wholemeal bread packed with the most festive of fruit and nuts. £3.50

Sourdough - Hels' Bakehouse's signature bread. Tastes delicious, good for the digestion and will see you through the festivities as it keeps well for toasting. £3.75

Blue cheese, Honey & Walnut bread - This one is like a ready made Cheese board. Yum! £3.00

Sage & onion bread - Pop this one in the freezer and bring it out to make an amazing boxing day sandwich with your left overs. £2.50

Croissants - Rich, buttery, flaky, fresh croissants available in packs of 4. Enough said! £3.20

Festive granhohohola - a Christmassy take on our original granola, this one is festively spiced and packed with pecans, cranberries and crystalised ginger. Available in 250g packs at £3.00 or our special Christmas gift jar £10.00

Availability will be limited so you'll need to get your name in fast. We'll be taking orders at the Christmas fairs or you can email me at info@helsbakehouse.com. The deadline for getting your orders in will be Monday 16th December.

Collection will be at Hels' Bakehouse HQ, 13 Blane Crescent, Blanefield between 4-6pm on each special baking day with mince pies and mulled wine waiting for all. All of my lovely loyal Bread Club customers are invited to drop in too as a thank you for your excellent support and bread eating skills over what has been an amazing year.

After that the McGougan sleigh will be heading down to Wiltshire to see the relatives with baking for the Bread Club starting again on 10th January.

It's almost enough to start making me feel Christmassy. Where's the sherry?

An apple a day

Autumn days are here and it's my favourite time of year. Cooler days, clear night skies, beautiful colours and a whole load of apples to deal with.

We have two apple trees in our garden and every year I see it as a personal challenge to see how many of them I can use. This year's crop hasn't been amazing, but it hasn't stopped me filling the freezer with apple purée for the Hels' Bakehouse granola and for stirring into my morning porridge with some scavenged blackberries from the woods.

For puddings there have been apple pies and my favourite Chocolate Apple Betty recipe from Nigel Slater's Real Food book. This is also a great way to use up bread crumbs which make a delicious crunchy topping which is so much tastier then a crumble.

The Bread Club got a harvest time treat of Apple & Cider bread which smelt amazing as it baked and was the perfect accompaniment to some nice strong cheddar.

Most satisfyingly my store cupboard is also now full of beautifully coloured apple & chilli jelly and Beetroot, apple & ginger chutney made with beetroots gifted to me from our local allotments.

The annual apple challenge has become part of the ritual of the McGougan year. It captures the memories of the summer and makes me feel like a wholesome, thrifty housewife, whilst all else around me remains in chaos. But most importantly it heralds the start of warm tasty dinners and treats stored up for the winter months ahead and is a damn good excuse for a tasty calorie laden pudding that sort of counts as one of your five a day. Waste not, want not and with any luck with the amount of apples I've eaten over the last few weeks the doctor should be in for a quiet few months ahead.

Celebrating Sourdough

One of the things that has surprised me most about starting Hels' Bakehouse has been the number of people who say "I'm not sure if I could get through a whole loaf." Perhaps I am just very greedy but my problem has always been more like, "I'm not sure if I can stop myself eating a whole loaf in one go!"

Anyway, last week there were a couple of unsold Sourdough's from Edenmill Farm Shop, so I decided that to tie in with Real Bread week (11th-17th May) that I would do a special blog post all about the mighty Sourdough loaf; how it is made, what makes it special and how you can make sure you use it all up.

Sourdoughs tend to be more expensive then your average loaf, which I think probably puts people off unless you have tried it before, but there are some very good reasons for this:

1. A good one will take around 24hrs to make from start to finish, whilst your average yeasted loaf takes just 3. This is because sourdoughs are made using a fermented starter, and therefore take much longer to rise and much more effort on the part of the baker to make something that looks like a loaf.

2. They tend to be larger and keep really well, so you don't need to worry about them going stale after a day or so. Make sure you store your bread in a cotton bag so it can breathe. It won't go mouldy and should be useable for up to a week.

3. They taste amazing! The texture of a good Sourdough should have a thick crust and a chewy flavoursome crumb. The flavour comes from using a starter of fermented flour and water which will have been lovingly fed and nurtured for many weeks, months and if not years. Google them and be amazed at how much you can sell some prized starer for!

4. They are good for you. Not only are the natural yeasts developed in the dough full of friendly bacteria, but the long fermentation process also makes the bread easier to digest. Sourdough is therefore a great choice for people who want to avoid that bloating feeling without giving up bread. People with mild wheat intolerances may also want to give Sourdough a go for these reasons as many have reported they find it much easier to tolerate. It's not gluten free though!

5. A little goes a long way - not only will this bread make the most delicious toast, it is the bread that keeps on giving! From dunking in soups to Italian salads or being the soup itself (I first ate Sourdough in San Francisco where they turn it into bread bowls for their famous clam chowder). This week I transformed my 4 & 5 day old Sourdough into the following delicious meals:

Bread & vegetable stew with white wine, chickpeas, fennel and home made basil pesto - an Ottolenghi recipe from The Guardian website:

Panzanella salad with oven toasted sourdough soaked in a tomato, red wine vinegar & garlic dressing with cucumber, capers, basil and black olives. This particular recipe comes from Rick Stein's Food Heroes book but there are loads out there:

I also attempted to capture the 12 step Sourdough making process on Twitter this week in my real time Life of a Bakehouse Sourdough photo diary. Check it out and find out what it takes to get from here...

to here...

to here!

If you fancy having a go at making Sourdough yourself then there is plenty of information out there about how to get started or you could sign up for a bread class with your local friendly Real Bread maker. Personally, I first went on a one day course with the wonderful Lesley Martin of Lesley's Kitchen and have never looked back (Tip: her cakes and welcome are as good as her bread!).

In conclusion, if you haven't tried it before give some Sourdough a chance this week and help to celebrate Real Bread by supporting local artisan bakers. Think of it as a bread investment and enjoy a great bread, made with love and packed as much with good feeling as it is flavour.

Breaducating Strathblanefield

So Real Bread week is but a stones throw away, but I decided to get the party started early in Strathblanefield with my first foray into Breaducation: teaching 25 Girl Guides how to make their own bread. We knew it would be messy, we knew it would be fun, but would any of them get the baking bug or would it all end in a sticky, yeasty mess? The answer of course is yes to both!

With only an hour and a half to get them baking I did a 'Blue Peter' and had prepared dough in different stages before hand so they could see each bit of the process before making their own in teams of three, which then got divided and bagged to take home, prove overnight in the fridge and bake the next day. They were then tasked with sending me a picture of their creations to be in with a chance of winning some Hels' Bakehouse goodies. Here's what they made:

First prize went to Iona Campbell for her amazing plaited loaf (second from top, puts mine to shame!), whilst Eilidh Jones picked up the runners up award for her well risen and nicely fired mini loaf  (top). Vivienne, was disqualified despite making multiple beautiful loaves (bottom picture), as she is one of the leaders!

I for one needed a large glass of wine and a long sleep to recover, and I did feel slightly guilty about the amount of dough stuck to clothes, hands, hair, tables and the floor, but it was great fun and brilliant to see all the Guides having fun and getting involved in their bread making efforts.

Hopefully it will not be the last time I venture into the world of bread making education, but for now I will enjoy the relative serenity & cleanliness of the Hels' Bakehouse kitchen at 5am with renewed appreciation!

Well done to everyone who took part and thank you for inviting me to share my enthusisam for Real Bread with you!

Springtime Community Fever

Hello blog, remember me? Time seems to be on fast forward at the moment and with the clocks going forward, the sun shining and the lambs in the fields it feels like the world is waking up again. Here on the west coast of Scotland we have quietly been enjoying a blue skied hiatus in the weather whilst the wind from the east blows unseasonable Siberian chill and random blizzards over the rest of the country. On some days I have even detected something I believe is known as 'warmth' in the suns rays and generally have been feeling cheerier as a result.

My 'power of two' plan, where I try to buy two things each week from local businesses and producers, also seems to be working and over the last few weeks I've enjoyed: bacon & black pudding from Edenmill Farm, honey & jam from Heather Hills Farm, hot chocolate from Cup in Glasgow, cheese from the Blanefield Deli, rapeseed oil from Stark, and a bag of delights including shortbread, yoghurt, vegetables, olives and fish from various local businesses at the Killearn monthly Country market.

The market runs on the first Saturday of every month and is a proper community venture, set up by locals to support local businesses and bring local produce to people in the village and surrounding areas. By the time I arrived after my post-baking nap at 12pm the hall was buzzing with people and the stall holders were smiling as most of their produce had already been snapped up. Better yet, for £2.50 you could sit down for a cup of tea and all you can eat home made cake with profits going back into the community to support the village tennis club. I came away feeling re-motivated about the idea of living locally and inspired by the people in the community who work so hard to make sure it happens.

Over Easter I had a little taste of that myself when I ran the first Hels' Bakehouse pop up shop in the Blanefield Village Club on Good Friday. The hot cross bun sale was a sell out and I was touched to see so many people taking an interest in what I was doing and coming along to buy some buns and find out more. People were full of ideas about how to build the business and really interested in the whole concept. It's always good to have some reassurance that you are onto a good thing and I'm looking forward to the next opportunity to do something similar. May is Real Bread month so I think some kind of event will be in order, but first I think I will just sit back and enjoy the fact that Spring is in the air and that local life is good!

Baking fever

Right then, here's what's been happening since I last wrote: I've left my full time job, found a part time job, filled up the Bread Club with lovely customers, been on a yoga retreat and slept a sum total of about 4.5 hours (not really, but it feels like it). There is no going back now and in between the waves of terror and panic I am super excited.

Today is the first sourdough week and the logistics of making 10 long fermenting loaves in a domestic oven with a four year old building Lego at your feet have been challenging, but I've done it and seeing all the lovely fresh loaves lined up and cooling in my kitchen makes me smile from the inside out.

My lovely friend Rowena, who makes one off original bags in her spare time has also agreed to make me some bread bags for my customers. The first prototype arrived today and it's fantastic. Storing your bread in a cotton bag is the best way to keep it fresh as it allows the air to circulate and stops your loaf going mouldy. Even when the bread goes stale you can still use it for bread crumbs and of course it's also good for the environment.

Hels' Bakehouse: saving the world one loaf at a time!

Shaking the tree

It's been a strange week, but a good one for promoting what's great about living locally.

First up we had the horse burger scandal, where the supermarkets all got caught out for using suppliers that have been less than scrupulous about what they put into their products. Apart from producing some of the best tasteless jokes I've heard in ages, it was brilliant to see the reaction from all the farm shops and independent butchers on Twitter as they capitalised on the opportunity to promote the provenance of their superior delicious meats. Special mention has to go to Macbeths Butchers for their inspired press statement in The Coo's News.

Meanwhile, whilst the business news was all about the death of corporate giants on our beleaguered high streets, one British family were basking in the national coverage attracted by their attempts to spend a year only buying British products. The Bradshaw family's mission promotes all that is great about home grown local producers, service providers and manufacturers. You can follow their progress on @BritishFamily and through their website www.britishfamily.co.uk

Finally, we've had snow (well everywhere apart from here), and although the national reaction to the white stuff has been a little ridiculous, with reports of mass panic buying of sliced white from supermarket shelves, the independent Real Bread bakers were quick to start shouting about their ability to keep their local customers supplied whatever the weather.

Personally, I'm ready to join the revolution and have been working hard to get Hels' Bakehouse off the ground. I've come out of the baking closet and have set up a new Facebook page, I've been getting the web pages ready for www.helsbakehouse.com (nearly ready to go!) and best of all I've been baking!

This week saw the first test run of the Hels' Bakehouse Bread Club, with three willing volunteers ready to sample a loaf of Real Bread from my own micro bakery (previously known as my kitchen). There's a lot still do to perfect the routine, and I've already learnt some important lessons about planning ahead, volume and timing but that's what the test run is all about and it was a fantastic feeling to finally get things underway. As my new favourite artist Nell Bryden sings, it's time to Shake the Tree.