Bake Off

Mr. Murphy

* Camberwick Green parking permit: 98 %
* Faithful to his wife: 100 %
* Selling delicious walnut cakes for 5 shillings: 100 %
* Brian Cant voice-over: 100 %
* National Treasure: 96 %
* Flour supplied by Windy Miller: 100 %
* Baker Man: 99 %

Mr. Hollywood

 * Camberwick Green parking permit: 0 %
 * Faithful to his wife: 2 %
 * Selling delicious walnut cakes for 5 shillings: 1 %
 * Brian Cant voice-over: 0 %
 * National Treasure: 3 %
 * Flour supplied by Windy Miller: 0 %
 * Baker Man: 10 %

Best thing since sliced bread

If this blog was a tabloid newspaper, the banner headline above would read something like this: 'BAKING BREAD KEPT ME SANE,' SAYS EX-TOWNIE. The truth is a little less prosaic; when I was getting my head round my (by now) much documented move, I read an article in a recent CAMRA magazine about the bond between beer and bread. When adding beer to the flour, yeast and water 'alchemy is unleashed.' So said writer and broadcaster Sue Nowak whose article 'Thorough Bread' ignited my passion.

To cut a long story short I'm now getting the ullage from my local pub and am baking dozens of loaves every week. My unique bread (each loaf is different, depending on the ale I use) is, for better or worse, the talk of the town. Well, alright, the talk of The Sun Inn! I recently spoke to Sue Nowak on the phone - we talked at length about about beer & bread and pubs, the upshot being that she's coming over to The Sun, next Tuesday evening, to see us all and sample the pub's excellent cask beers. And my (soon to be world famous) bread. Cheers!