Month: December 2020

I am filling my head (and tummy!) with chocolate. Researching, learning, trying out, tasting.
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I have decided that I want to roast the raw cacao beans I buy before making chocolate. This for two reasons:
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1 – Cacao beans are fermented and I did not do that fermentation. I don’t feel comfortable with exposing my family to potential moulds/bacteria that might still be present on the beans. Roasting kills any baddies.
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2 – I like the flavour! Acid is decreased and that toasty yum comes out.
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I am learning that, like all stages of the chocolate-making process, roasting is challenging. I don’t have posh kit; I used my cast iron pan. Unfortunately, I burnt them a bit.
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I then cracked and shelled the beans by hand.
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I do not do well with sugar, so am on a quest for the best 100% cacao chocolate I can make. Once ground, I added a 50/50 mix of cacao butter/coconut oil and mixed.
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The taste is good. The texture is finely-gritty, let’s call it ‘stone-ground’!
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Next batch won’t have any burn 😉
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Pictures and video do this much more justice than my words. Check out my story today for a chocolate-covered walk-through!

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This is Borş. An interesting word and food stuff. In Romania, the tradition I’ve learnt it from, it is sour liquid made from fermenting bran in water. Once filtered, the probiotic-laden liquid is used as a base for soups and as a drink.
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It is historically a food made from ‘waste’; the bran that would have been thrown away. In that respect it’s similar to the Scottish ferment ‘Sowans’ that I make – that was traditionally made with ‘waste’ from the milling of rolled oats.
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I am electrified to learn that traditions of disparate populations would basically *do the same thing* with waste from their local grain. That’s ancestral food wisdom at its best.
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So, living in Italy, I made this modified version with home-ground local spelt. All I’ve added is water. This is day 2 (I expect it to take 5-7 days). You can see the fervour of the ferment – the bran has been lifted above the water line thanks to bubbles!.
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I will use home-made Borş in our Christmas dinner, which is going to be a Romanian dish of stuffed fermented whole cabbage leaves. I made an IGTV vid yesterday of me prepping the whole cabbage leaves for fermentation, if you want to check it out.
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In the meantime, I’m drinking this liquid. It is good. And @irina.r.georgescu says I can even use the spent bran as a face-mask…photo may follow!!

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These are fermented millet and sorghum polenta bread slices which have been fried till crispy. I love them for breakfast, topped with ground linseed and dehydrated, super-crispy nuts
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They are also good for a quick supper. I make the loaf (check my story today for more info) at the weekend and then have something I can pop in the cast iron pan weeknights to crunch up while I pull together the rest of our meal.
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The fermenting is important (to me, at least!). It is easy, brings a yummy sour flavour and makes them easier to digest.

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I have made this loaf every week for the past 18 months. It is a winner – pure and simple. Nutty spelt, zero-waste, crunchy crust, soft crumb, lots of rise, slices well and stays soft.
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It’s so good; I’d love you to enjoy it too, so I’ve written the recipe up as this month’s #ancestralcookup. There’s a link to it on my profile.

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