No bread is an island

...entire of itself. (With apologies to John Donne!)
I live and breathe breadmaking. I’m an evangelist who would like everyone to make his or her own bread. I want to demystify breadmaking and show it as the easy everyday craft that it is. To this end I endeavour to make my recipes as simple and as foolproof as I possibly can.

I call my blog 'No bread is an island' because every bread is connected to another bread. So a spicy fruit bun with a cross on top is a hot cross bun. This fruit dough will also make a fruit loaf - or Chelsea buns or a Swedish tea ring...
I'm also a vegan, so I have lots of vegan recipes on here - and I'm adding more all the time.

Tuesday 21 October 2014

Open letter to Jay Rayner

Dear Jay

I've always had a soft spot for you - possibly because I loved your mother and everything she did.

And you've always struck me as a reasonable sort of bloke when I've seen you on TV, or read your articles in the Observer.

But to read your comment that 'everything is better with bacon' has lead me to feel a modicum of pity for you - which is not something I could have anticipated.

I'll grant you that the comment may have been made as a throw-away, slightly tongue in cheek line, guaranteed to get a response, but, really, even to entertain the thought for a second reveals a lack of imagination.

In fact, you have the argument on its head - the sentiment should read, 'everything is betterwithout bacon'. 

As a guy in my late 70s, I grew up with the 'Meat and 2 veg' mindset. Vegetables were an adjunct, an add-on to the main event - the meat. And I'm sure that mindset includes perhaps 95% of Britons - but should it include yourself, Jay? If the answer to that is 'yes', I would be very disappointed.

I consider myself a moderate cook - but when I became a vegan 12 years ago, now, I found I had to start thinking out of the box. 

If I, an average to moderate Emoji cook can produce, healthy, tasty - really flavoursome - dishes without meat, time after time, imagine what amazing things you could conjure up?

I love my food, and I eat very well - but there's an added bonus to 'everything is better without bacon' - it comes guilt-free!

Warmest regards, Paul

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