Another pointless thread

They stayed home today, so it was a quiet day. They may not bomb tomorrow either as the weather is taking a turn for the worst.
They publish the details of when they will be bombing, or shooting on Vlieland, and when they are doing exercises. Night flying all through November, now the bombing, so hopefully they will take December off.
April will see Frisian Flag again with lots of foreign air forces joining in the fun. Great for those who enjoy photographing such things.
Nonetheless I still prefer the bombing and fighters to the Schiphol jets we used to put up with. When we first moved to NL we were in a no fly zone due to a big US base near us, and a royal palace. The Americans left, the royals died and the commercial flights moved in.

Definitely something that would be cool to begin with. The novelty would run out pretty quickly though. Do the vibrations have any impact on buildings and structures? I can imagine stuff like home insurance would be a bit more expensive to compensate.

Gotta sympathise with local dogs (and their owners) when all those bombs are going off.

When there was a naval base at Portland, they used to hold weekly wars miles out to sea. Humans could hardly hear anything, but our dog was terrified, digging and chewing anything within reach. Once tried to chew through the plastic pipe connecting cistern to toilet.

Steve

For far too many years now I've been baking my own bread, I cheat by using a machine to do the dough but finish off by hand.

So What?

Well Mrs HG got a bee in her bonnet about 'sour dough' bread. I've avoided it, I know how time consuming it is. While my dough is mixing in the machine I tend to do other things, tidying up, photo editing, drinking coffee etc.

Well, she tried to do her own SD bread. Er!

3 bricks latter she used what was left to do some biscuits.

Well what can I say? the biscuits are supper, unlike the bread...




My bread and Mrs HG's biscuits

Dwarf bread (see Disc World books by Terry Pratchett). "Various forms of dwarf bread can be used as weapons, e.g. battle muffins and drop scones" (Feet of Clay). The Scone of Stone is made of it (The Fifth Elephant)

It sometimes appears in my house, too. Best not to comment on it or its use as a weapon may be demonstrated.

Steve

Once you have a sourdough starter it shouldn't be that hard. I think my brother makes it in his machine, keeping the starter (mother) going is another matter entirely. When his brother in law is away my brother feeds their cat, but when my brother goes away his brother in law feeds the starter!
Good on Mrs HG for at least trying.

Not being able to get strong bread making flour here I gave up making my own.
When we lived in Wantage I used to walk down to the mill and buy my flour there. Between the walk down and back up and the kneading I burned any calories the bread might offer me!

Have you tried Aldi or Lidl. They stock strong bread flour in the UK (>60p) and it's great for bread making.

Yum, beats shop bread every time.

They don't stock it here, I've looked.
They are very different shops here to in the UK.

If / when you come over, could you stock up?! One bag does me four loaves (one loaf and two fishes short of feeding the 5,000!)

I could, but I always forget!
No idea when I'll be over next but I shall try to remember then!

Amazon?

Try to avoid them if I can. There are a couple of British food shops in the Netherlands, so maybe I'll look at them some time.
I do miss an airing cupboard when it comes to bread making! Yes my fancy new oven has a proving setting but an airing cupboard would be nicer.
His Nibs said oh if I get some strong flour can I also make crumpets. What have I started!!

Ok Aldi flour is good, but not always available in my local store. There are other shops that stock it so worries.

I use a French bread recipe and enjoy making interesting loaves.

But today is Friday, and I can hear a bar calling...

Once upon a time in KSA, I recall people using malted loafs in with their fermenting ales. Then jars of malt extract were sourced in Bahrain and so began another chapter in the ongoing effort to perfect the recipe.

Don't tell His Nibs, but I have found a source of strong French bread flour online here.
Once the festivities (if you can call them that) are out of the way maybe I'll order some and have a go. It will be handmade not in a machine, and it is a loooong time since I made any bread, so I expect a doorstop rather than an edible loaf but who knows?
If I'd thought about it whan I go the new oven I could have had a steam oven, which would have been great for bread making. Instead I went with His Nibs idea of a self cleaning one. Never used the self cleaning function though - I am terrified of it.