Hello from NL 30. This is Bake Sense, the somewhat ordered record of ramblings that concern the world of baking, from championing flavour and wholesome ingredients to questioning where those ingredients come from and how we can make the most of them. Along the way, you’ll find recipes and insights from life in and out of the professional bakery and plenty of fruitful chat.
To access a back catalogue of bonus recipes and receive future behind-the-scenes content, consider subscribing to the Extra Credit portion of the newsletter.
The descent into Autumn, it’s here; I can feel it, see it, taste it. As we packed up the bakery for a (very) short break in production, I looked over the fresh produce; it still spoke of summer, British corn cobs, courgettes, strings of beady redcurrants, hunky beefsteak toms, a few fuzzy pêche jaune.
‘Break’ is a very loose term for the week-long period that will see the bakery ‘closed’ for production, both for wholesale and retail. In reality, it’s three days of nothing happening before things need to start happening again if we are to have products to sell when we reopen, but three days is still a blessing.
I’ll spend that time picking out the over, under and perfectly ripe pieces left unsold and direct them accordingly to the dehydrator, a shelf in the freezer, a bath of brine or a suitable vinegar vessel to preserve this moment in the season so we can revisit it in the months ahead.
I’ve already made a start and, in doing so, noticed the staining power of the season, from picking over the hedgerows in search of the fattest brambles to de-stoning prune plums for drying and tossing turmeric spiked gherkins for bread and butter pickles. Sure, you could wear gloves or, in some cases, use tongs, but these hands are the best kitchen tools I have, and I’m compelled to use them.
Elsewhere this week, these hands have levelled and carved cake layers, built signifiers of celebration with an architect’s eye. These late summer birthday cakes are always some of the best, and the most recent have featured my new favourite Swiss meringue buttercream. A rich emollient to cover sponge, the perfect shade of buff to show off crimson red roasted blood peach and bruise-coloured blackberry jam. The recipe for this will be in the Extra Credit version of the newsletter.
At home, an iteration of Clare de Boer’s Torn Peach Cake (but with torn plums and brambles) further proves that hands make for something more visceral and enjoyable about the experience of making—especially in domesticity. The fingers you use to pull apart the fruit will be the ones you lick the batter from and use to pick the crunchy caramelised almonds from the top of the too-hot cake as it exits the oven. These are your hands, and this is your making in your home, so do as you please.
If plums are as plentiful for you as they are for me, you’ll be baking them into everything. A few recipes that have caught my eye this week include -
Shortbread Plum Tart With Honey and Cinnamon
Plum & Apricot Brioche Tart with Crème Fraîche Custard
And, if you made the Citrus Olive Oil cake way back in February, I invite you to revisit it with tart plums in tow; they work a charm.
I seek out the prune plum varieties for their meaty texture and rich fruit flavour; a variety called Hanka is proving to be perfectly freestone (flesh not attached to the pit) and makes for easy work when preparing them for cakes, tarts and jams.
Clingstone varieties (flesh clings to the pit) tend to be more translucent in flesh, gage-like and juicy. If you find a lot of flesh remains stuck to the pit when preparing them, fear not, it need not go to waste…
Plum Scrap Vinegar
Pits with prime flesh attached make excellent infused vinegar. Cover them with white wine or apple cider vinegar in a jar or large bowl if you have a lot. Cover with a lid or cloth secured with string to deter fruit flies and leave for two weeks, agitating occasionally.
Drain and decant the infused vinegar into a clean bottle, seal and label. Use for salad dressings, marinades or cocktails. I like to add a splash to season jams before jarring, to add interest to glacé icings and to cake soaks and syrups, where it balances the sweetness.