Tag Archives: Oven Bottoms

Blog Post-Summer Food Projects- Good for your Kid and Good for You!

Farl a.k.a “Oven Bottoms”

Last summer, my son, Joseph, and I started a baking project.  Every Wednesday when he was off from school we took a few hours in the kitchen.  It was just us alone, unmitigated by anyone or any technology.  That project is memorialized in one of the first posts of the Guys and Food effort called Wednesday Baking with Joe.

I learned a lot about baking, my son, and myself as you can read in detail in the article.  For those reasons, we deemed the effort a success and this summer we’re doing it again!  However, this year we chose Thursdays for logistical and time management reasons.

The way it works is that I give him two or three cookbooks and he chooses the recipe.  Barring anything unreasonable such as a hard-to-get ingredient, or procedure that will require many days, or some sort of expensive equipment that we don’t own, we usually turn to the job at hand.

Week 1- We brought back a favorite from last year.  Its called Farl and it’s a British bread also known as “Oven Bottoms.”  This year’s version came out better than last year’s.  The crust and the crumb of this butter enriched bread were both better and it seemed better tasting than I remember.  It’s from “100 Great Breads” by Paul Hollywood.  He is one of the judges on “The Great British Baking Show” shown on PBS.  It’s known as “The Great British Bake-Off ” across the pond.

Joe is still trying to figure what is up for this week.  I’ll keep you posted and the project continues.  In the meantime, if you have a young person in your life, this is something that is both fun and educational to do while at the same time keeping them from the gaming abyss and ticks in the woods. Like these, it doesn’t require applying a burning cigarette for removal.   You also have a chance to make some great memories;  I really recommend it!


You see, aside from the podcasts, there are blog posts too!  Aside from this, you can find another example.  Go to guysandfood.com and read my piece on the  benefits of an instant read thermometer. 

The most recent podcast is on wine labels explores whether terms such as “organic” and “sustainable” actually mean something important to your wine drinking experience or if they are merely marketing ploys.  Remember to subscribe to the Guys and Food podcast in Apple PodcastsStitcherGooglePlay, and Tunein Radio.  In social media you can find us on Facebook and Twitter!

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