In the kitchen again

One of the lovely things about coming home is being able to work in my own kitchen. You don't realise how much you have tailored it to your own needs until you are away and don't have your own utensils and pots! Not to mention all my cookbooks, the store cupboard and the kitchen garden.

When I got home from work last night I set to work and made some bread and some Roasted Tomato Soup for our lunch today. The bread is coming good. At the moment I use -

1 lb of Tesco Strong White Flour
4 oz Shipton Mill Three malts & sunflower flour (described as being the colour of speckled hens - who could resist that?)
1 sachet dried yeast
salt
1 tsp sugar
1 tbsp sunflower oil
warm water

Mix all the ingredients. Kneed for 10 mins and form into ball. Cover and leave to rise until double in size. Heat oven to 200 c (my oven is a fan oven). Slash top of loaf, and put in oven on metal tray. Cook for 10 mins. Turn down heat to 180 c, and turn loaf round in oven to cook evenly. Cook for futher 20 mins, then turn over to cook base for 5 more mins.

Leave to cool for 1 hour.

As I've got lots of tomatoes in the polytunnel I decided to make some Roasted Tomato Soup at the same time.
Simply fill large roasting tray with halved tomatoes. Add 2 onions cut in half. Add 3 or 4 cloves of garlic. Splash of balsamic vinegar. Season with black pepper. Drizzle over olive oil. Cook in oven at same time as bread, on shelf below it.
When mixture is cool, take skins off tomatoes, onions and garlic and then blitz in blender with some water to reach consistency you like.
Serve with drizzle of basil oil and toasted pine nuts.