This month marks Sourdough September, an annual event created by the Real Bread Campaign. Sourdough baking relies on just a few natural ingredients: flour, water, salt, water and yeast. At its heart is the sourdough starter, comprising naturally occurring yeasts and bacteria. It’s easy to make your own starter, just follow my method here. Your sourdough starter can survive with only periodic (in my case once a week) attention, and […]
The Covid-19 pandemic almost stopped modern civilisation in its tracks, and it is not yet over. For many of us, enforced lockdown was a time of reflection on the way we live our lives, the way we interact with our local community, the way we work and even the way we eat. In a survey carried out by YouGov, 85% of respondents said they wanted to see some of these […]
This recipe for Oriental roast plum sorbet with macadamia and sesame brittle is the latest in a monthly series of recipes I have created in partnership with Suma Wholefoods. In these recipes, I use products from Suma’s extensive range of organic and ethically sourced products, and the recipes appear both here on my blog and on the Suma website.
The benefits of gardening in respect of mental health and well-being are now well documented. Indeed, garden therapy is increasingly prescribed by doctors to help tackle anxiety, loneliness and depression. But research from the University of California suggests that gardening can also help tackle the growing problem of obesity, especially amongst children. We now know that being overweight puts us at greater risk of serious illness or death from Covid-19. […]
A recent report by the UK’s House of Lords Food, Poverty, Health and Environment Committee has looked, amongst other things, at the disproportionate rates of obesity amongst poorer families. The report has concluded that our current food production and pricing systems conspire to make unhealthy food much cheaper than it should be. Obesity is one of the so-called underlying health conditions that increases vulnerability to Covid-19, as well as a […]
This recipe for tomato and spinach risotto with confit tomatoes and basil puree is the latest in a monthly series of recipes I have created in partnership with Suma Wholefoods. In these recipes, I use products from Suma’s extensive range of organic and ethically sourced products, and the recipes appear both here on my blog and on the Suma website.
It was announced earlier this week that about 200 staff at a Herefordshire vegetable farm and packing business had been ordered into isolation on the property after 73 workers tested positive for Covid-19. Not long after this news was reported, stories began to emerge about squalid working conditions on the farm prior to the outbreak. It was claimed, for example, that employees had to work in the farm’s packing house […]
Despite being closely allied to the meat industry, the dairy industry is often overlooked as a huge net contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions. A recent report, Milking the Planet, produced by the United States Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), has revealed the shocking scale of combined emissions by the world’s largest dairy corporations. Between them, the world’s thirteen largest dairy corporations produce the same level of greenhouse […]
This recipe for cauliflower tempura with pickled ginger and coconut curry sauce signals the resumption of my association with Suma Wholefoods after an enforced hiatus due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Suma, a wholefood cooperative, and one of the largest of its kind in Europe, has performed wonders to keep its key supply chains open over the past few months. At the heart of each of these monthly […]
This week the UK government further eased restrictions on the lockdown in England that has been in place for almost three months (Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are subject to slightly different, and generally more cautious, restrictions). Curious to see how the populace would respond, I must confess to a feeling of deep depression at the sight of long queues of cars at fast food drive-throughs and of people lining […]