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Being a mum is challenging work. And striving to do so ‘ancestrally’ when the world is not set up to support it makes the task even harder. Creating community and helping each other is of utmost importance.

@farmandhearth @fornutrientssake @nourishthelittles and I are recording a Q&A next week dedicated to ancestral food and motherhood in which we’ll concentrate all our (four-fold!) energies on any concerns and questions you have. No question is too ‘small’ or ‘silly’.
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Send me a DM with what you’d like us to cover and I’ll make sure it’s in the line up.

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The last of this season’s chestnut flour made up into a castagnaccio, sprinkled with fennel seeds and ready to go into the oven.
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I used the fermented oat liquid swats in this mix instead of water and I left the pan in the fridge overnight to allow the biotics in the swats to do their thing on the chestnut flour, lightly fermenting it.
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Looking forward to trying the result.
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If you want the recipe for the castagnaccio, send me a DM. If you want to know how to ferment your oats into a creamy porridge and a probiotic drink, check out my sowans course over at @thefermentationschool – there’s a link to it in my linktr.ee.

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Number 14 of The Ancestral Kitchen challenge is ‘use fat in a new way’.
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I love mayonnaise. But I’ve not had it these last few years because the only oil I’ve been prepared to make it with is olive. And decent olive oil is strong; too strong for me to like the mayo it creates. When I heard @farmandhearth was making hers with bacon fat, I knew I wanted to have a go with my home-rendered lard.
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The most important thing to remember, as I’ve learnt, is to use half lard, half olive oil and to warm the lard so that it is just liquidy (not hot hot). This way you can drizzle the lard, along with your olive oil, into the yolky mixture slowly.
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Not wanting the buzz of my food processor, I turned to the mortar and pestle. It was *so* much more satisfying this way.
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This is 2 yolks, lemon juice (I don’t like mustard in mayo), 1/2 tsp of miso (why not?!) and, I think, about a cup of fat.
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I’d love for you to join in the challenge. It’s 22 prompts to inspire you to get creative in your kitchen. Check my story or click the link in my linktr.ee for more details.

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Fermented chips in progress!
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When I saw the extent of @kirstenkshockey’s recent crazy potato chip fermentation, I knew I had to join in! This is a bog-standard white potato, chipped roughly and then covered in a 5g salt/1cup water brine.
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I’m planning to leave this for 3 days to do its bubble magic and then bake the chips up.
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My son can’t eat white potatoes, so I’ll be popping out later today to get some sweet potatoes in and will give them the same treatment.
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Are you curious too? Want to join in?

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Anyone else use cast iron on a halogen hob?
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We’re renting, and the stove-top (called hob in the UK!) is halogen. I use my Lodge cast iron pan on it daily. In order to do so, I have a small metal ‘converter’ disc that goes between the pan and the stove.
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My pan is 8 inches across, but the disc I have is only 5 inches. It’s been bugging me for a while and I’ve wanted to get a bigger disc…but there always seems to be a higher priorities for our budget and the reviews online for these discs are not that great.
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Does anyone have experience here that could help me?
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Thanks!
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P.S. I couldn’t resist snapping this photo of the glorious purple cabbage that @radiciumane supplied my kitchen with this week 🙂

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Want to up your pizza game?
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Recording today’s podcast episode was a total joy for me. An hour+ talking about pizza…almost (but not quite) as good as actually eating it!
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Listen in to hear the surprising history of the most-loved of Italian food (did you know that most Italians didn’t know our modern-day pizza until the 1970s or later? ) along with an in-depth discussion of the practicalities of making it (sourdough) at home – dough, toppings, baking and much more.
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You’ll also hear me confessing a pizza kitchen disaster to @farmandhearth which I’ve not been brave enough to share on here before 😉
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Everything we mention is in the show notes, including my recipe for spelt sourdough pizza, which you can also find in my linktr.ee on here if you want to have a go this week (I say do it :-))
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Find the podcast at @ancestralkitchenpodcast, on Apple podcasts and downloadable from my site, link also in profile.

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Want to get started with sourdough or need help with your sourdough starter? Next Saturday, I’m doing Zoom session dedicated to how to create and look after a rye sourdough starter.
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It’ll be an hour long, bring your questions…after talking you through the process, I’ll cover as many of them as I can.
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The session is offered free with option to donate and support my work.

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The crunchy bits left over from rendering lard are one of the most loved things in our kitchen.
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We often eat them straight, warm, with salt, on the top of our meal. But I also love to create with them. Here’s the latest experiment; rolled spelt sourdough buns peppered with the delicious crunchy, fatty ‘niblets’ (as my son named them) and some large salt granules!
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There are pictures of the process in my story today.

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Grain mills are expensive. But grain is so much cheaper than flour, and, if you can buy it in bulk, it’ll last.
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When I considered a grain mill a couple of years ago, I talked with my hubby, Rob, and knew we couldn’t justify an expensive mill. I’m not the only one with desires in the family, he’s been a musician without a guitar for most of the last two years!
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We ended up buying a manual hand-crank roller mill, the Marcato Marga. It doesn’t grind grain anywhere near as finely as a stone mill, and it requires arm power, not electricity. But we love it. Rob grinds and reads out loud to us in the evenings. And we are used to ‘rustic’ bread…
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…like this wholegrain rye sourdough. You can see the flour weaving through the crust in this picture. It’s dense but it’s delicious.
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If you want to get started with sourdough and love rye, I’m planning a ‘Make & Maintain a Rye Sourdough Starter’ Zoom on Friday 12th of Feb. More details coming soon.

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A pancake-stack-for-breakfast kind of morning. Spelt discard pancakes (literally just discard, flour and water) left out to ferment overnight and then cooked in the cast iron pan in lard.
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I eat my pancakes savoury, not sweet because I don’t eat sweet things (not even fruit). I often get asked why I don’t and how I manage it. Here’s the short version:
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Why – because if I eat sweet things I get vertigo migraines on my cycle. This is debilitating and not worth it. It took me about four years and much experimentation to figure this out!
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How I manage it – after some time, it’s not as bad as it sounds! Taste buds adjust; you taste sweet in other things. My ‘treats’ take other forms – 100% chocolate, freshly-made mayonnaise, delicious bread and butter. I want to live, not put up with stuff, and my tried-and-tested ‘experiment until you learn’ mindset means I’m totally up for changing habits to improve things.
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Going without sweet is not for everyone. It supports me, I think because I super-overinduged on sugar as a kid. Being twice the weight I am now messed me up somewhat! But still, if you want to lessen your sugar intake, know it’s do-able!
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Back to my pancakes: these are layered with linseed, barley miso and local olive oil. It’s misty and cold here this morning and they helped me ease into my day.
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If you want to share about sugar stuff or what you had for breaky, please do 🙂

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