Many years ago back when @st.john.restaurant opened in 1994 I was very obsessed with finding old recipes, and especially #barmbread methods which were once the staple of Scots baking. I’d start with the books listed in the bibliography in Elizabeth David’s “English Bread & Yeast Cookery”, then go to the old British Library, then in the British Museum, go through the card catalogue, request the books, read them then request the books listed in those books, going down a rabbit hole of research. I kept a notebook with all the recipes I could find. Later at @johntorodecooks’s Mezzo in Wardour St (1995?) I started making barms from scratch, going to the old home brew shop that used to be in Old Street, my old stomping ground in the 80s when it was the haunt of photographers and artists.
Then my notebook, as things do, disappeared. Did I give it away, did I lose it, some how it left my life and though life was flying so fast that I forgot about it there was a time lately when I’d wonder what happened to it. Around the same time, almost a side story really, the American food writer Emily Green was trying to convince @neals_yard_dairy cheesemonger Martin Aspinwall @canterburycheesemongers, @richardbertinet and myself to work together and start a 100% sourdough bakery at the then almost-derelict @boroughmqrket. We didn’t, but wonder today what might have happened if we did?
Almost 25 years later I’m planning what to bake at @_grainz_in Australia and #barmbread it would be. I remembered those experiments and though “maybe today I have the skills and knacks to succeed with it”. Though practice and conversations I started to think about what I could show everyone, and deep down I felt that this barm-making workshop would reconnect me with those old days.
So there I was in Trentham last Monday, slightly nervous about the workshop as it still had a high failure possibility, when Leona Kadir @kaleona came up with a quiet hello and told me that Martin Aspinwall @canterburycheesemongers had a book he wanted to return to me…and that book was my barm-making notes from all those years ago. Thank you Martin, thank you Leona @kaleona, and thank you @_grainz_
