Brown Sugar-topped Mascarpone Scones

I'm not really a scone person. To me, they're more like bread than cake and that's no fun at all.

I saw this recipe in my Lorraine Pascale book (becoming a regular feature on this blog, I know) and they sounded divine, which, coupled with the fact that there was some left over mascarpone cheese in the fridge, meant that I had to make them.

I decided to liberally sprinkle these with some demerara sugar after I had glazed them. This gave them a lovely crunchy top, which was a nice contrast to the dense, rich texture of the scones.

Delicious.

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Banana and Walnut Loaf

I have been feeling pretty under the weather and I wanted to bake something comforting.

This banana bread did the trick.

I don't know why, but for some reason I never seem to be able to get banana bread right at all.

It always seems to sink when it comes out of the oven for me.

This one, which I adapted from Lorraine Pascale's Baking Made Easy book, came out perfectly.

I haven't figured out why this batch turned out ok and my other banana bread endeavours didn't, but this will definitely be the recipe I work from in the future.

I used dark brown sugar, which I think gave the loaf a lovely rich, deep flavour. You may choose to use caster sugar or light brown sugar, which is used in the original recipe.

I like to eat mine slavered in butter, how do you like to eat yours?

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Basil Focaccia

Today I was having a bolognese for dinner.

I love bolognese combined in the traditional way with spaghetti but today I just felt like something different, so I made this bread to accompany my sauce.

I'm not very experienced in the art of bread making and I've only ever made sweet bread until now.

I think one of the reasons I shied away from bread is because I had this idea in my head that it was really hard to make I thought that I would find it difficult to know whether I had kneaded it enough or left it to prove for long enough or any other number of worries.

What I've learned it that really there's no need to worry about these things. Most recipes will give you quite detailed instructions, so you will know whether your dough is the right consistency or exactly how long you need to let it prove for.

It is quite simple, really!

Focaccia is quite a simple bread to make, with few ingredients in it.

I dotted the top of mine with finely chopped basil, but you can use whatever herb you want depending on what you're serving it with.

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