Cottage Pie

Green Bean glut is sorted, thanks to http://pickyourown.org/beansfreezing.htm, so the job of the day is to blanch and freeze the bean glut. However - having just done the beans - I don't think I want to see a green bean ever again.

There is quiet a bit of veg ordered this week, so the trick I need to achieve this week is to ensure none of it gets wasted.

One tip when Tesco deliver your veg, take them out of the bags, or put your thumb through the bag, this will stop them sweating and also store them in the fridge. Another tip is each day, go through your veg checking what is needing to get used up, and think how you can incorporate it into a meal. Also ignore the use by date, go back to good old common sense, if the veg looks OK, smells OK then it is OK, so we can reduce food wastage.

So what have we on the menu today, lets have a Great British favourite - that is always a family winner - good old Cottage Pie.

Cottage Pie

Approx Cost - £2.50p
Serves - 4 people

Ingredients:

• 600g peeled potatoes, quartered
• 100ml milk
• 40g butter
• Salt and ground black pepper
• 1 TBLSP oil
• 1 finely chopped medium onion
• 1 finely chopped medium carrot
• 2 clove garlic finely chopped
• 400g ground/ minced beef
• 500 ml beef stock
• 115g finely chopped white mushrooms
• 1 TSP of dried parsley
• Dash of Worcester sauce
• 1 TBLSP all-purpose flour
• 50g grated Cheddar Cheese

Method:

•  Boil the potatoes until soft, drain. Place the milk and butter in the pan with the boiled potatoes and mash, and set aside
• Heat the oil in a large pan. Add the onion and carrot and fry on a medium heat for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the garlic and cook for another minute. Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside.
• Add the beef to the pan and fry gently until browned. Depending upon the quality of the mince being used, if there is a lot of fat then strain the fat from the mince
• Add the carrots, onion and garlic, plus the mushrooms and parsley to the meat and cook on a low heat for 5 minutes
• Add the flour to the pan and mix, cook for another minute
• Add the beef stock, bring to the boil, turn down to a simmer and cook with the lid on for 20 minutes
• Remove the lid, increase the heat and reduce the liquid until the sauce has thickened, stirring (See picture)
• Taste and season with salt and pepper to desired taste
• Place the cooked meat mix into a suitable dish and cover with the mashed potato. Sprinkle the grated cheese on top of the potato and bake in the heated oven for 40-45 minutes until the surface is crisp and browned.
• Serve and enjoy !!

The onions, carrots and garlic cooking

All the ingredients combined and cooking before adding the stock

With the stock added and simmering

The meat mix ready for the potato topping - note how much the sauce has been reduced

The finished assembled pie ready for baking

The cooked cottage pie

2nd Tesco's order and Gammon cheese and onion flan

Well it is Tuesday, and the Tesco's order was put in last night for delivery today.

So what have I got left from the previous week shopping:

• 4 Chicken breasts
• 4 pork shoulder steaks
• 1 Gammon Streak
• 500g of pork sausage meat
• Chillies - which I have chopped up and frozen, they are easy to pull apart and use
• 9 eggs
• 1 very very large piece of ginger (I got the order wrong on the weight), so I am going to store it in the freezer cut into usable chunks for when I need it - http://www.wikihow.com/Store-Ginger
• 500g of cheddar cheese
• 110g of pecorino cheese
• 6 Onions
• 750g butter
• 2 bulbs of garlic
• 825g of Trex
• 250g of Halloumi
• 765g of mature Cheddar cheese
• 300g Un-smoked thick cut back bacon
• 1.065 KG pork belly
• 1.3 KG white potatoes
• 1 KG long grain rice
• 3.7KG Strong white bread flour

Food wastage this week - 169g of Cabbage

Total cost of this weeks food order- £23.41p

Items on this weeks food order:

2 X Tesco Salad Onions Bunch - £1.34
800g Tesco Beef Steak Mince - £2.74
1 X Tesco Green Cabbage - £0.76p
400g Tesco Everyday Value Closed Cup Mushrooms - £0.95p
400g Tesco Fresh Beef Casserole Steak - £3.30p
500g Pre-Packed Leeks - £1.70p
600g Tesco Unsmoked Thick Cut Back Bacon £4.00p
2.5KG White Potatoes - £1.35p
Tesco Mixed peppers 3 pack - £1.65p
6 Tesco Free Range Medium Eggs - £1.48p
500g of Tesco Everyday Value Penne Pasta - £0.30p
250g Tesco everyday Value Lasagne Sheets - £0.39p
3 Pack Tesco Organic Garlic - £0.90p
4 Loose Brown Onions - £0.46p
2 Loose baking potatoes - £0.64p
5 Loose Carrots - £0.44p
1.1KG of Green beans - £1.00p - Yes you have read this right !!

I now have a problem - I asked for 50 loose green beans, Tesco substituted this and I now have 5 bags of 220g green beans, which would have cost £5 but they charged me £1 in a price match. The problem is what the hell am I going to do with them all.......

So last night my mind turned to tonight's tea, and whilst I was digging through the freezer , I came across a lone 250g un-smoked gammon steak hiding at the back of the freezer, which I got for my wife when I went on a two week walk, so out it came, to defrost overnight. The good thing about this recipe is you can use whatever you have as the filling.

Gammon Cheese and Onion flan

Serves 4 people
Cost - approx £2.00
Ingredients:

250g of Gammon
1 onion - thinly sliced
2 TSP of oil
250g of plain flour
125g of butter
Pinch of salt
approx 100 ML of Cold water
2 medium eggs
150 ml of milk
1 TSP of mustard powder
Salt and pepper
65g of grated Cheddar cheese

Method:

• Trim and cut the meat into small cubes
• In a frying pan add a little oil and heat gently, add the onions and allow to cook on a low heat for about 20 minutes or until very soft and translucent, stirring occasionally so they do not burn. Once cooked remove with a slotted spoon and set aside
• Turn up the heat a little and add the meat to the frying pan, and cook the meat through until slightly browned. Once cooked remove with a slotted spoon and add the meat to the onions and mix
• For the pastry, add the flour to a large bowl and add the butter and salt, and gently rub in until the butter and the flour look like fine breadcrumbs
• Take a TBLSP and add one TBLSP of water one at a time, mix with a knife until the mixture comes together and you can form a ball of dough with your hand
• Wrap the dough in cling film and put in the fridge for at least 30 minutes
• Grease a flan dish
• To roll out the pastry, take a sheet of grease proof paper and lightly sprinkle with flour. Place the dough in the centre and flatten , sprinkle the top of the dough with a little flour and roll out, until it is large enough to line the base and sides of the flan dish. The benefit of the grease proof paper is that you should be able to pick up the paper with the pastry on it and turn it over, rather than trying to get it of the bench
• After the flan dish is lined with the pastry pop it back in the fridge for 30 minutes, then trim the edges. Note - you could blind bake the pastry for a crispy base, but I like it unbaked
• In a bowl whisk the eggs, milk, salt and pepper and mustard well
• Take half the cheese, and sprinkle onto the base, then add the gammon and onions, pour in the whisked eggs and milk, and then sprinkle the rest of the cheese onto
• Place in a pre-heated oven 220 Degree C, and bake for 40 minutes
• Cool on a wire rack and enjoy !

The Gammon to be used in the flan

The diced gammon

The Flour and butter mixed to resemble bread crumbs

The formed short crust pastry dough

The rolled out dough ready for lining the flan tin

The lined and trimmed flan tin

The finished Flan

Grilled Chicken Breast with pecorino cheese with spicy pasta

This is the simplest of all meals , that is made from store cupboard ingredients
Cost: Approx - £1.40p
Serves two

Ingredients:

2 Chicken breasts - flattened
25g of pecorino or parmesan cheese finely grated
390g tin of chopped tomatoes
1 tsp of pepper
1 tsp of dried basil
2 cloves of Garlic finely chopped
150g of dried pasta

Method:

• Flatten the chicken between 2 sheets of cling film with a rolling pin and season with salt and pepper

The flattened Chicken Breasts

• In a pan combine the tomatoes, pepper, basil and garlic and put on a high heat to bring to the boil with the lid of, once boiling reduce heat and cook until reduced - you are looking to get rid of most of the water - so you are left with a rich like paste
• Put the tomatoes into a blender and blend until smooth - you could miss this step, you jest end up with a chunkier sauce

The Finished Sauce

• Pre-heat the grill, and put the seasoned chicken onto the grill rack, turn occasionally until cooked
• Meanwhile cook the pasta according to the packet instructions
• When the chicken is cooked, put the cheese on top and return to the oven, until melted and bubbling
• Just before serving add the sauce to the pasta and stir in

Serve and enjoy...


The finished meal

An Easy Saturday - even cooks take it easy

The household kitchen has been working hard this week, and so have I, so no major recipes today as the meals are fairly self-explanatory, as you can see from the photographs below.

The rules and regulations of our household state that weekends begin with a lovely breakfast. In fact the first words out my wife's mouth when she wakes up on Saturday, is "what's for breakfast?". I had a pack of lovely thick un-smoked bacon from a previous Tesco order, so we started the day with buttered toast, topped with bacon and a poached egg, all washed down with a lovely mug of stewed tea.

Breakfast cost approx £1.26p per person
Tea cost approx £1.50p per person

Saturday delight, buttered toast, bacon and poached egg

So for tea (it is tea where I come from), it does not come more simple than a jacket potato with cheese and a seasoned chicken breast quarter. Apart from the few minutes preparation, I can just bung it in the oven and relax. My wife will want cheese on her spud, me I just like it with loads of butter.

It does not get simpler - Seasoned Chicken Breast Quarter and a Lovely Jacket Potato

There is one member of the household, that hasn't been introduced, but who is never too far away, and that is my beloved cat Mr Gonk, who always gets something when I cook. I was a bit disappointed when we took him to the vets recently and they described him as a "COMMON black and white domestic cat", COMMON, there is nothing common about him.

Quick and Easy Tea - Sweet and Spicy Chicken Breast Strips with Fried Mushroom Rice

Last night's meal was a great success, not a single morsel left on any of the plates, with fantastic comments for the steak and ale pie.
I needed a quick tea tonight, as we didn't get home until late, and I did not want to arrive home and say "lets order a take-away", most of which ends up in the recycling food bin - as it is not really good food from our local take-away, plus it defeats the purpose of trying to save money and waste on food. So a quick browse on the internet, I came upon what appears to be a rather nice recipe - http://allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/9811/sweet-and-spicy-chicken.aspx - so credit must go to the cook who posted this, as it is absolutely fantastic.

So I have gone through the bag of chicken breasts I got on my last Tesco's order, and I have taken out the ones with the least weight to use for tea tonight, to use the larger on for something else.

This dish is only quick if you prepare things in advance, i.e. rice cooked, chicken cut, sauce made, chillies, garlic and ginger chopped - all ready just for assembly.

Note - while the recipe below is for two people, the original recipe is for four people.

Cost - approx £1.50p
Serves - 2 people

Ingredients:

For the fried rice:

• 100g of long grain rice
• 1 TBLSP of olive oil
• 150g of closed cup mushrooms - wiped clean and finely chopped
• 3 TBLSP soy sauce
• 2 TSP of Chinese five spice
• 1 medium chilli - deseeded and finely chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic finely chopped

For the sauce:

• 1 TBLSP dark brown soft sugar
• 2 TBLSP honey
• 4 TBLSP soy sauce
• 2 TSP fresh root ginger finely chopped
• 2 cloves garlic finely chopped
• 2 TBSLP hot sweet chilli sauce

For the chicken:

• 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast fillets, cut into 1cm strips
• 1 TBLSP vegetable oil
• salt and pepper to taste

Method the fried rice:

Tip - Make the rice ahead of time, as it needs to be cold.

• Cover rice with water
• Bring it to the boil
• Once the water is boiling reduce the heat to as low as possible and simmer until the rice is cooked
• Rinse and drain the rice under cold water
• Store the boiled rice in a food container and put in the fridge

Method for the sauce:

• Mix together dark brown soft sugar, honey, soy sauce, ginger, garlic and hot sauce in a small bowl and set aside

Method for the chicken:

• Trim the chicken if required
• Cut the chicken into strips, place chicken in a bowl, add the oil and mix - the oil just stops the strips sticking together
• Lightly salt and pepper the chicken strips

Cooking the meal:

• Heat oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add chicken strips and brown on both sides
• Pour the sauce over the chicken. Simmer uncovered until the sauce reduces and thickens, 8 to 10 minutes
• Whilst the chicken is simmering, in a separate frying pan, add some olive oil, and add cook the mushrooms for a couple of minutes, then add the garlic, chilies and five spice and cook for one minute
• Add the rice and the soy sauce, and cook on a high heat, stirring all the time until the rice is cooked through and piping hot
• Serve the chicken and the rice, enjoy..

The finished meal

Steak and Ale Pie

It is a special evening tonight; we are entertaining my wife's parents. It is my mother-in-laws 60th birthday. I always get nervous about cooking for them, as they have very specific likes and dislikes. However the good thing is that they like what I call "proper traditional grub".

So after much thinking and much consultation with my wife, I have decided to make a mouth-watering Steak and Ale pie with short crust pastry, served with mashed potato, green cabbage and carrots.

Ideally I would have made the pie filling yesterday, but I forgot one very important ingredient for Steak and Ale pie - the Ale, so I picked this up today a nice bottle of Black Sheep Ale.

The approximate cost of the meal per person is £2.50p

I looked around for a recipe, but didn't really find one that ticked all my boxes, so this is my version.


Ingredients for the pie filling

800g diced beef
3 TBLSP of plain flour
Pepper
Oil for frying
200g of closed cap mushrooms, wiped clean and halved
2 onions, peels and sliced
1 TBLSP sugar
4 garlic cloves, crushed
300ml good-quality beef stock
300ml brown ale
1 TSP tomato purée
2 TSP of dried thyme
3 TBLSP Worcestershire sauce
1 TBLSP of flour

Ingredients for the pastry

200g plain flour
Pinch of salt
100g butter - diced
Cold water
1 egg beaten for glazing the pie

Method for the filling:

• In a bowl add the flour and pepper and mix
• Add the beef into the bowl and mix until the beef is covered with flour
• Add some oil to a frying pan, and cook the beef on a high heat in batches until browned all over
• Once browned remove the beef with a slotted spoon and set aside the beef in a large pan
• Add a bit more oil to the pan, and fry the mushrooms for 2 minutes, and set aside with the beef
• Add more oil, and add the onions and sugar and cook over a medium heat for 20-30 minutes, stirring often until brown and caramelised
• Add the garlic to the onions and cook for 1min
• Add the TBLSP of flour to the onions and mix well
• Put the onions, beef and mushrooms in a large pan and mix well
• Add the thyme, Worcestershire sauce, tomato puree, stock and ale to the pan and bring to the boil
• Reduce heat and simmer gently with lid on for two hours
• After two hours taste and adjust seasoning if required, also try some of the meat to ensure it is very tender, if not allow to cook a while longer
• Remove from heat and allow to cool
• After the meat is cooked, take a colander and strain the gravy - you should if everything has gone to plan have a lot of gravy (it will become clear as to why)
• Place the meat into your pie dish, and pour some of the gravy over the meat, you do not want the gravy to be above the meat. See below picture.

• Set aside the remaining gravy to serve with the meal

Method for the short crust pastry:

• Place flour and salt in a bowl
• add the butter
• Rub the butter into the flour until it looks like fine breadcrumbs

The flour and butter rubbed in

• Take a tablespoon and start adding the water, one tablespoon at a time, mixing the water into the flour and butter. Repeat adding the water until the dough comes together

The resulting dough after adding the water

• Put the dough in a plastic food bag/cling film and put it in the fridge for at least half an hour

Method of assembling the pie:

• Take the dough out of the fridge and roll out
• Cut a thin strip and brush egg round the edge of the pie dish
• Put the all-round the edge of the pie dish and then brush with the egg

The pie rim lined for the lid

• place the rolled out lid onto the pie
• Then with a tines of a fork, press gently down to seal
• with the remaining egg brush the top of the pie to glaze
• Cook for 50 minutes at 220 degrees C and serve

The pie ready for baking

Smoked Kippers

We are having some beautiful Scottish smoked kippers tonight, on homemade toasted bread with poached eggs and cold savoury rice. This is a very cheap meal, but delicious meal. So here is tonight's recipe.

Cost - approx £1.00 per person
Serves 2

Ingredients

 For the kippers:

• 2 Smoked kippers
• 1 TBLSP of plain flour
• 1 TBLSP of butter
• Pepper to taste

For the poached eggs:

• 1 TBLSP of vinegar
• 2 Eggs

For the bread:

• 2 slices of thick bread
• Butter

For the savoury rice:

• 100g of long grain rice
• 1 onion finely chopped
• Two tablespoons of oil
• One clove of garlic, chopped finely
• 5 closed cup mushrooms - wiped clean and finely chopped
• One vegetable stock cube
• Pepper to taste *
• 300 ml boiling water **
• Pinch of turmeric

* Note I have not included salt and this will come from the stock cube
** You may need more water, just keep adding a small bit at a time if you do

Method for Savoury Rice

Ingredients for the savoury rice

• In a pan give the rice a quick wash and drain
• Add the water, turmeric and vegetable stock cube to the pan
• Place the pan on a medium heat, with the lid on, stirring once in a while
• When the water is bubbling, move the rice to the lowest heat possible and cook
• Keep a check on the water and top up if required, you are looking for the rice to be soft and the water absorbed
• Whilst the rice is cooking, gently fry the onions, garlic until very soft and translucent about 5 minutes, do not let them brown

The fried onion, garlic and mushrooms

• Add the chopped mushrooms and cook for another 5 minutes
• When the rice is ready, add the fried onions, garlic and mushrooms to the rice and stir well, season with pepper
• Now the trick is to cool the rice quickly for food safety reasons. Place the rice mix in a large bowl and set aside for 10 minutes, turning every few minutes
• Place the rice in the fridge

The finished savoury rice

Method for the kippers

• Add the flour and the pepper to a bowl and mix well
• Dredge the kippers in the flour on both sides
• Melt the butter in a frying pan and fry the kippers to your preference *

*We like ours very well done

Kippers

Method for the poached egg

• Whilst the kippers are cooking, bring a small pan of water to a rolling boil
• Add the vinegar and turn the pan down to simmering
• Add the eggs
• Cook for 3 minutes
• Remove with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen paper
• Whilst the eggs are cooking toast the bread and then butter

The eggs poaching

Finally assemble the meal and enjoy. Note. Before serving the chilled rice, get a knife or fork and gently separate the grains by tuning it through the rice as the grains will have stuck together during chilling.

The final meal

Breaded Pecorino Cheese Chicken Breasts and our Tesco Order for the Week

Our Tesco's order for the week got delivered today - so the blog can really begin.

Tesco charge a delivery fee for bringing your groceries to the door, the off peak delivery charge for today's order is £3.

The aim of the listings below is to try to decrease the build up of food over the weeks and thereby reduce the weekly shopping bill further, by only buying what we need for the week, using up what we have and also reducing the amount of food we throw out.

Food left over from the previous tesco's orders:

• 3 Chicken breasts
• 4 pork shoulder steaks
• 500g of pork sausage meat
• 2 smoked kippers
• Chillies - which I have chopped up and frozen, they are easy to pull apart and use
• 3 eggs
• 1 very very large piece of ginger (I got the order wrong on the weight), so I am going to store it in the freezer cut into usable chunks for when I need it - http://www.wikihow.com/Store-Ginger
• 250g of cheddar cheese
• 150g of pecorino cheese
• 6 Onions
• 250g butter
• 5 bulbs of garlic
• 900g of Trex
• 250g of Halloumi

Things like jam, tomato sauce and store cupboard items I have not included, otherwise the list would go on forever.

Total cost of this weeks food order: £44.32p

Items on this weeks food order:

1 X Savoy Cabbage - £0.76p
2 X Chicken breast quarters - £2.38p
4 X 250g of butter - £4.00
2 X 300g Unsmoked thick cut back bacon - £4.00
2 X 410g Diced beef - £7.00
1 X 400g closed cup mushroom - £0.95p
1 X 943g bagged chicken breast fillets - £9.99p
2 X 350g mature cheddar - £4.00p
1 X 1.065KG pork belly - £5.33p
1 X 2.5KG white potatoes - £1.35p
1 X 1KG long grain rice - £1.39p
2 X Strong white bread flour - £1.75p
4 X loose brown onions - £0.37p
2 X baking potatoes - £0.58p
5 X loose carrots £0.47p

During the week, I will show recipes with what I have done with the food, and see how much I have left over by next Tuesday, and see how much we can reduce the next order by.

Recipe

Tonight we are having breaded pecorino cheese chicken breast with pasta and cheese sauce, as I have a couple of chicken breasts left over from my last order, plus some pecorino cheese lurking in the fridge. This is a very cheap meal, and it can be stretched further if you have young children by halving the chicken breasts after they have been flattened.

Ingredients

Servings for 2 people

For the breaded chicken:

• 2 Chicken breasts skinless and boneless
• 8 TBLSP of breadcrumbs
• 3 TBLSP of finely grated pecorino cheese
• 1 Egg - whisked
• 2 TBLSP of plain flour
• 2 TBLSP of butter for frying

For the cheese sauce:

• 12g of plain flour
• 12g of butter
• 150 ML of milk
• 90 g of cheddar cheese grated

For the pasta:

• 150 g of dried pasta

Method

Method for the breaded chicken:

• Trim any excess fat of the chicken breasts

Chicken breasts about to be trimmed

• Lay a strip of cling film on the work surface, place chicken breasts on the cling film and put another strip of cling film over the top

The chicken breasts covered with cling film

• Take a rolling pin and gently hit the chicken breasts to flatten them out

The flattened chicken breasts

• In a separate dish, mix the grated pecorino cheese and the bread crumbs together

The mixed breadcrumbs and pecorino cheese

• In separate dishes lay out the flour, whisked egg, bread crumbs and cheese mix in front of you for ease

The ingredients ready for coating the chicken

• Take your flattened chicken breasts and dip them in the flour
• Then dip them in the whisked egg
• then dip them into the bread crumbs and pecorino cheese mix
• Melt the butter in a frying pan, and place the chicken into the pan. Note. Set the heat to low-medium, if you have the heat too high the outside will cook before chicken
• Cook the chicken, turning occasionally for approx 20-25 mins or until the chicken is cooked through and the outside nicely browned

The chicken cooking

Method for the cheesy pasta:

The sauce ingredients ready to go

• Put your pasta on to cook as per the instructions on the packet
• whilst the pasta is cooking, in a small pan melt the butter
• Add the flour and mix, over a medium heat and cook for about 30 seconds, stirring all the time

The flour and butter combined and cooked through

• Take the pan of the heat, and add the milk gradually and stir. Note - if you add the milk to fast you will get lumps, so add it bit by bit and stir into the paste
• Once all the milk has been added, return the pan to a medium heat and keep stirring all the time
• Eventually the sauce will thicken
• At this point add the cheese and melt it into the sauce
• Drain the pasta and return it to the pan, and pour the cheese sauce into the pasta and stir to coat the pasta
• Plate up, pouring any remaining butter in the frying pan over the chicken
• Serve and enjoy

The finished meal

Our daily bread

Bread, a big part of our daily life for thousands of years and it still is today - so today I thought let's make a simple loaf of white bread, and show how easy it is and fun.

I think we lose something when we buy the packaged loafs from supermarkets. The amount of bread our household wastes by throwing it out when we buy pre-packaged loafs is amazing, however make your own and there is little or no waste - because you have made it and spent a bit of time looking after it - I think you care about it more so there is less waste. There is nothing more satisfying and pleasurable to making and eating your own fresh bread.

People say they do not have time, but they have time to spend hours in front of the television, so lets combine the two. Can you spend 30 minutes to watch a soap opera, then you can spend 30 minutes effort to make a lovely fresh bread loaf. The most amount of effort from a person making bread is 20 minutes of kneading, then bread itself then does all the hard work.

The benefits of making your own bread:

• You know what goes into it - basic ingredients - no shelf life prolonging ingredients
• You will use it  - because you have made it and spent time caring for it
• It tastes better - especially toasted with loads of butter
• There is less plastic packaging so it is better for the environment

Most people fear making bread, but I can guarantee that no matter how your bread turns out, you will enjoy it.

Supermarkets know that the smell of bread is unique so they tend to have open bakeries that let the smell of baking bread waft across the store to tempt you, so why not create your own happiness in your own home. Bread making is not complex, it is simple - we have been doing it for thousands of years, so dive in and create your own loaf of happiness. If you do not have a loaf tin then so what - just put the dough on a tray when you are ready to put it in the oven and end up with a round loaf rather than a square loaf.

So tips on making bread:

• Ignore the recipe on the packet, it usually leads to a heavy bread
• Use strong bread flour
• Spend a little extra on some decent flour and which is not mixed with other ingredients (perhaps to thin it out to make it cheaper)
• Do not let the bread to over rise, there is a thing called oven bounce, which is what pushes your bread up, this is where the yeast organisms munch away and create air bubbles as the temperature in the oven heats the dough and hence make the bread rise
• Pre-heat the oven and when you put the bread in don't slam the door shut, and don't open it to see how it is getting on until it is ready
• Kneading is the key - do not skip this or cut down on the time - 15 minutes of hand kneading is what you are aiming for the first kneading
• Let your dried yeast develop before adding it
• Most recipes say leave the dough to rise in a warm place, actually, if your house is 18 - 21 degree centigrade that is OK
• Be patient
• Finally - just enjoy making it and eating it

So step by step on how to make a loaf of happiness:

Costs:

500g of flour - 20p
Yeast - 8p
Other ingredient approx - 2p
Total cost - 30p

As the price of bread varies differently at Tesco's, I will only show what a loaf of bread costs to make, rather than comparing.

Ingredients:

500g of strong white bread flour
1 1/2 TSP of Salt
1 TSP of sugar
7g of dried yeast
15g of soft butter
300 ML of luke warm water
Flour for dusting

  

OK - lets start making the bread.

Step 1 - Get the yeast going

• Take a measuring, measure 200 ML of cold water and from a boiled kettle top up to 300 ML with hot water, and stir
• Open the dried yeast and add it to the water, give it a little stir into the water and set aside for 10 minutes.

OK - so why are we doing this, the packet says it is ready to use. By doing this you can see if the yeast is active, so you do not waste your flour and your time if the yeast is inactive, all you have lost is the dead yeast

Adding the yeast to the water

The yeast bubbling after 10 minutes

Step 2 - Make the dough

• Whilst waiting the yeast to activate, add the flour, salt, sugar and butter to a bowl
• Rub with your fingers the butter into the flour
• When the yeast is active, add the water and yeast to the bowl (See picture below)

• With a knife start to combine the flour, water and yeast (see image below)

• Pull the dough together, and lightly flour the work surface, tip the dough out and gently start to fold it over itself and begin kneading the dough. I knead the dough for 15 minutes.

The dough initially turned out

The dough after 15 minutes of kneading

Step 3 - Letting the dough rise

• Place the dough back into the bowl
• Lightly oil some cling film and place it over the bowl and leave for 45 minutes

• The dough will rise, and this is what you should have

• Lightly grease the loaf tin with butter
• Then take your dough and push it back down in the bowl (See image below)

• Turn the dough out on to a lightly floured surface and knead again for 5 minutes
• Place it in to the loaf tin and cover again with the cling film

• turn the oven on - set to 230 degrees C
• Leave the bread to rise once again - you are not looking for the loaf to rise high above the tin, as thanks to oven bounce, that will push the dough up. Below is what you are looking to achieve at this step

• Once the above stage is achieved, usually about 30 minutes, place it in the oven
• After 15 minutes, turn the oven down to 200 Degree C and cook for another 20 Minutes
• After cooking turn out on a wire rack and leave to cool

Here is the finished bread