Wholemeal Bloomer

 Another Home Baker's Club bake and one set for February 2026, but of course Jack's demonstration can be accessed at any time to suit.  Today I tried Stone Baked Wholemeal Bloomer, but not to the letter!

I didn't want to spend the time heating up the stone, and I didn't feel confident in using the couch tehnique for the final rest.  And because I didn't use the stone, I skipped the 10 minutes off at the start of the baking.

I loved the slash pattern and the loaves rose nicely, though you cannot really tell by these overhead picture.  

Yeasted Banana Bread

 Another success from the Home Baker's Club over at Bake with Jack's.

What I learnt:

Yeasted Banana Bread is excellent and pecans are an excellent substitute for dark chocolate chips

The four strand plait is easy and fun and would work nicely with other flavoured doughs whether sweet or savoury

It might be an idea to shape the loaf and allow to slowly rise overnight to bake first thing in the morning.

I often start my baking a little too late and have to leave the loaf cooling overnight, hence the idea of having a freshly baked loaf in the morning by allowing the slow rise overnight.

Slices were frozen, and will be easy to pull out the night before for breakfast.  I shall try it toasted.

All dried out - In a Vase on Monday

The fresh garden flowers are taking a break this week, allowing me to show some of the dried flowers prepared last summer.  The vase is a soap stone one bought in China and given to me by my mother several decades ago. 

 

The pale green of the vase is not quite the right hue or shade to match with fresh foliage and flowers, so at last it gets an outing and pairs fairly well with some of the flowers I dried last year.  

Pseudodictamnus acetabulosus

Pseudodictamnus acetabulosus dries well and keep its form, and Origanum 'Emma Stanley' too with the colour only fading slightly.

Origanum 'Emma Stanley' dried

I have quite a few dried poppy seed heads around so choose three for the vase, and at the base are three more where the outer skin has been removed to leave the fine inner formations. A couple of years ago I noticed such 'skeletons' where I had dropped poppy seed heads on the beds, and used it again last year to great advantage.

With fellow gardeners who love to bring some of the garden indoors,  I am linkins this post to Cathy's In a Vase on Monday. 

In the Garden at the start of February 2026

 This post is one where I note six things from the garden, and like others link this to Jim's anchoring post. Last week Jim posted some 'then and now views of his garden plants' and as I was looking through and trying to delete old pictures I came across a couple of interesting ones. For the 2026 picture of the Chamaecyparis, I had to go out in the pouring rain this morning!  It has been the wettest of weeks, with just one day of a few hours without heavy rain.

1. This lovely golden evergreen started off as a very small specimen when I bought it in May 2019, three years later it had already been potted up twice.

Chamaecyparis pisifera var. filifera early 2021

Now it is a fine specimen and the pot is almost too large for me to move. Had I room in the garden it would probably have been planted out.  However in the pot it does look good standing on the pebbled area.

Chamaecyparis pisifera var. filifera 2026

2. I took cuttings from a friend's shrub in Kenwilworth, and since then have taken even more cuttings.  One of them was planted by the bird bath.

Lonicera 'Baggesen's Gold' Feb 2023

In the Summer of 2024, I had one of those frequent urges to do a little prunning and turned the Lonicera  into a pompom topiary. This is how it is looking this week.

3. We had one day of glorious sunshine, sufficient to warm the cockles of one's heart, and in the garden there was the sound of bees and a huge bumble bee, and flowers were opening.

Crocus chrysanthus 'Romance'

4. I often prune the rose bushes around mid February, but all the mild weather has led to earlier growth.  It doesn't take me long to prune the several bushes, rambler and the other climbers, all were pruned this first week of February.

Ghislaine de Feligonde new shoots

5. I like little plants and this week two of my smallest snowdrops are in full fligh in the Conservatory bed. One which is slowing increasing is Galanthus Margaret Billington (Formerly Quadripetala) . With small upright stems as the blooms open the call me to check the number of petals, snowdrops usually have three outer segments, but this one varies from three to five outer segments.  

Galanthus Margaret Billington

Whether the it is the same bulb that grows more segments as it matures I am unsure.  When I attend the Snowdrop festival in Shepton in a couple of weeks time, I shall try and ask the growers.  I bought this one early in 2023 when we visited Jenny and Mike Spiller at Elworthy Cottage, and since they will be at the festival they will be the best to ask.

The second little snowdrop closeby is Galanthus nivalis Charlotte.  Last year I divided the small clump, and I am delighted that the small bulbs survived this.

Galanthus nivalis 'Charlotte' 

6. In mid January I showed the northern end of the Conservatory bed with the darker cyclamen coum, the flowers are still growing strong and may actually be more floriferous, here is the bed a little further along, where the paler cyclamen coum are making their mark. I've mentioned before that I am aiming for the Millefleur effect in the spring for this border and it certainly is close to achieving this.  Yet to come out are the primulas and corydalis.  Starting in January, growing through February, and into March, this little bed is one of my garden's delights at this time of the year.

Because I left the top of a bag of compost open last week, I now have a bag of 'compost soup'!  And speaking of love: I have a pair of robins what come to check if I have anything for them, but they are still very shy. Here is one the cock I think on the wall.

Turkish Simit

 I've been baking our regular bread which ranges from a wholemeal cobb to a seeded multigrained sourdough, but I haven't been more adventurous and trying out new recipes for a few months. It was seeing my friend on Facebook with his trial of the other recipe this month that pulled me out of the doldrums.  So thank you Nigel.  Together with Nigel we set up a facebook group that worked our way through all the recipes in a new sourdough recipe book. Having like minded pals can really help with encouragement etc.

For February the Bake With Jack club were given two recipes of which this is one of them.  For Turkish Simit you need Grape Molasses.  I couldn't believe my luck, but I had recently bought a jar of this up a Rocky Mountain without any idea of how I was going to use it.  I do like buying different ingredients which I are new to me, and now I have opened the jar, I shall be exploring more uses.

As you can see, I need to work on my shaping and proving techniques, and I have an inkling of what I shall try differently. 

I also bought some Pistachio Butter, which I think will go very nicely with this, perhaps topped with a little honey.