UKCruiseJeff

Thanks Terry. The Welsh do very good cakes. In thanks for your request and kindness … this is todays cake corner …..

Is it passover already?! That passed me over. Oy gevalt. Thanks Lois … in my complete innocence I have just mixed and baked a manor house fruit cake the ingredients of which I have been dggedly composing and finessing for a few weeks or so because you cannot buy a good fruit cake and I need one but sadly it doesn’t include any matzo. I’m waiting for it to bake and smells wonderful and whilst waiting for it I have made wifey and me a ham and egg and cress and mayo in crunchy home made ciabatta So I’m now down on several on the yiddish front on several infringements. In my own defence I genuinely believe that our leader has a sense of humour and probably dislikes matzos except with butter and chopped liver. 🙂

Concierge?

Hi, I read your thread with interest because I might have parciated in those exchanges some years back, I really agree with your views and for what it's worth I'd add my two cents to what I see as the context of the Butler thing both then and in the light of what I see as future converging trends. The butler thing from recall wasn't SS being pioneering but followed another line somewhere removing stewards and dressing up stewards and calling them butlers. From flakey memory this coincided with Downton also hitting the US psyche and I think it caught a zeitgeist with people thinking that they were going to experience something that was obviously never going to happen. Butlers on cruise lines and in hotels – except the very very few where there is a single butler allocated to a single eye-waveringly expensive suite. I didn't like it also because I thought it simply a marketing deception which I fel was disrespectful to intelligence but I recognised it locked into an opportunity that was never really what was genuinely deliverable on the pack. At it's simplest a butler in the UK historical context version was always a male in a sole household that would orchestrate the male head of families life. He'd do all the stuff like lay out clothes make arrangements and manage the staff that did al the doings. The lady of the house would have a maid. A butler would never have several dozen bosses. Everything that would be asked of him would always be within his control. He'd not be in competition with dozens of other butlers to try and simply get their master in 801 on to the table of his choice in the overbooked restaurant of their choice. So butlers on cruises are not butlers. They are simply dressing up and pretending to be butlers. At the same time I also felt a potential loss of something my wife and I had previously really enjoyed. I think it was the lower level of barrier and informality. I felt that people dressing up as pretend butlers would take away some of the great experiences we'd have with some of the great stewards and even more stewardesses we'd had. It might be simply that they didn't dress up but we had several really individual stewardesses who were on a life travel experience and we'd lead them astray with time with us with them telling us their stories and drinking with us when they were on quieter moments of their duty. Calling us by our first names and bantering with us and teasing us. We really appreciated them and them us. I think we felt that Butlers would remove that whilst adding not much. I also see a societal change and it's been there for a while. Highly successful people are increasingly less stiff and formal and those that are tend to be more formal seem to me to be more more aspirational. Over generalised but it is what I see. So perhaps the deception of someone called a butler but who never was or is will start to fade and they might be replaced by younger informal highly intelligent and fun-loving but resourceful and engaging people who befriend rather than serve. I think that if there is a possible welcome trend it isn't to do with what they are called ... they should continue to do all the stuff you ask but there should be less suites for each of them and I think it would be nice if they morphed into more individualistic personalities that people read and engage more informally. Once again I know I make not much sense to others but I hope you get the gist.

Seasonal Greetings to all Coolers ... and to say it is wonderful to see the resilience of Coolers to find nuggets of existential gold for travels and experiences in a bewildering world. It's reassuring and lovely.

But the poster didn’t suggest or imply that anyone enjoying the wine was wrong to do so, did they.

One never tires of Seneca “Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for a kindness.””

It was a quote from one of her fictional books. It wasn’t an expression of her personal philosophy. My sin here is that I broke my embargo to defend someone who had been attacked. If it appears that I’m disappointed having seen your growth and path and finding your voice and blossoming here subsequently to be a poster leading that attack then I am sorry you feel that I’m wrong. I simply wished to defend someone from being harassed for expressing their opinion.

Agatha Christie is a much admired and loved fiction writer. Every single Agatha book wrote about several murders. I don’t think that even she would ever believe in her wildest dreams that a rational thoughtful person would think that she was a philosophical supporter of murder. Anyway … let Agatha’s writings be your guiding light …….

I’ll admit that I’ve been dozing all afternoon and just glanced back. I can cope within being sanctioned by the thoughts of Aristotle or Seneca or Socrates or Marcus Aurelia or Confucius …. but wait for it ….. Mysty has just sanctioned me with the thoughts of Agatha Christie in “The Murder at The Vicarage” and received “likes” There is no hope for me. I have been Agathered. Thank god it wasn’t Enid Blyton and The Famous Five. Best wishes all.

Good Grief JP .... All of us can express things better but it is how we deal with others on the internet that is the issue. You are saying that if I were to simply say that "Calamari in my view is disgusting" then that is OK and you will not attack me but if I say that "Calamari is disgusting" because I didn't add the words "in my opinion" that renders it as unacceptable and worthy of attacks? What your view leaves us with if that someone says "Silversea is wonderful" that will receive no attacks but loads of "likes" but if they were to say that "Silversea is NOT wonderful" they would be attacked unless they added "in my opinion". How helpful is that for people to learn from? Let us just leave it that I think more good and decent people are lost to this childishness than are welcomed in and that is a loss to all.

It is ironic that some only find their voice as a result of finding tolerance and kindness from others as a result of others being kind and welcoming to them. But a person makes a post with a personal opinion. How can an opinion be anything other than "personal"? And so another person feels attacked. Needlessly. And in the end they will not post. And their experience and opinions will be lost. It is a shame.

Just a shorty to say a bit of a belated adieu to Coolers. Seems like several life-times ago when on a rather rainy day nearly ten years ago I thought I’d ask for a place for people who meant well, but nothing much better to do to hang out …….. and I never really thought it would last much longer than a day or so. But now with around 35,000 posts and 1.4m views I’ve decided to duck out and wish all well. Jeff x

A wonderful picture of doughy loveliness. Those bottom two of perfectly innocent unadorned bagels are ones I can both smell and taste. I mean equal adoration to the others and supremely Ta muchly. For what it's worth I award you the Grand Medal of Bagel Chewiness. Please go forth and multiply. For what it's worth ignoring likes and lack of likes you are henceforth entitled to the nom du plume of FlyingScotSailors GMoBC. 🙂 Jeff

Thanks D, Don’t really do recipes because once you understand the principles you can make any bread variation simply viscerally if you get my drift. If you always use my very highly hydrated approach then this approach enables you to use any mix of flour you fancy at any given moment. I make my nutty, fruity, honey baguettes in exactly the same way as my standard ones. It is incredibly liberating not following recipes. It just needs that initial confidence, Bagels are very simple and are only different from a standard highly hydrated dough by the following. It is a dryer mix say 60% hydration with added malt or honey to the mix. Allowed a normal rise but not allowed the second rise or prove. That’s the first difference. That quick second rise from dough is done with the one or two minute boiling in malted water before baking. So you are not boiling bread that has just had the second rise. So the boil kills the yeast and stops further rising. If it has had the second rise you simply say “Naughty boy” - and knock it back for it’s boil. The boiling both gives the chewy crust and retards the proving giving the denser chewy characteristics of the bagel. The simple adjustments to that approach the second time you do it will decide things like ‘would i like it sweeter. Would I like it more chewy. What toppings do I want ie nigella, poppy, sesame etc’ Hope you give it a try. You will make better bagels than you can every buy because they will be exactly as you like them. I really mean this. Anyone and everyone can make better baguettes than they have ever tasted, even in the “baguette of the year” winners in Paris. The same with bagels etc. I like a darker bake as you can see. I also love onion bialys which you can no longer buy in most UK bagel places so you have to make them if you want to eat them. In fact I haven’t seen them sold for over 40 years. I’m going on again about bleedin’ bread. I can bore for England on bread. I just feel that everyone can make their days happier by making bread.

Thanks Ducky, I hope you are going to get baking! I’m more than a one trick pony! I also got so fed up with driving all the way from Jeff Towers on the Hampshire/Wiltshire border to Brick Lane in London for bagels or bialys at 2am I decided I had to make them at home. The last lot I bought. I bought a dozen and I asked for the well done dark ones and by the time I got home there were only two left for the wife! “Where’s the rest of the bagels! You’ve been gone for five hours and come back with two bagels. How many have you eaten …….” So I had to learn bagels. And they had to pass the Brick Lane test ……

Thanks. You will find me every morning taking Breakfast On The Morning Tram with the extraordinary Stacey Kent ……. 😋

Thanks ….. As you are liking my humble offerings. Another to tempt. For some reason us Brits although we grow no oranges we make sublime marmalade and jams, and I have invented a baguette especially for a breakfast baguette. So imagine waking up with an overnight slow doughy rise of a nutty fruity baguette with a little wholemeal and honey in the blend, freshly baked and allowed to cool. A lovely espresso or three and a very cold glass of Laurent Perrier to start a great, great day.

A fine example of the species. Myster is doing great. 🙂

Thanks so much for the kind word. There is a baguette for every cunning plan. This is my baguette when I’m thinking of having a cheese baguette. Just my plain old baguette with onion/Nigella seeds. I do so hope you enjoy it and thanks again.

If you are able to find it, President butter is widely available and their slightly salted spreadable is 100% butter and made in Normandy.It’s a lovely French butter. I hope you can smell this and can enjoy the crunch of the crust and the soft fragrance of the very aromatic crumb. It has been nowhere near a mixer and there is absolutely no need for that silly kneading. I do the opposite. A mixer and kneading is the enemy of bubbles. The less I do the better are my baguettes. This is what my plain ones look like …..

A little hesitant to offera possibility as it is probably a cul-de-sac. Have you tried following the original link from your login, copy the url in the browser by right clicking and copying, and then pasting it in a note etc and see whether there is a 9 digit number imbedded in your original url, if you get my drift? It might be there and this might display your 9 digit number.

On the topic of baguettes. You wont believe me but all that altitude stuff and and humidity stuff is reassuring but I promise you is almost entirely unnecessary For what it is worth. Ditch the blender it is totally irrelevant to bread making and if anything damages bread. Adding more water and letting water get on with it improves your baguette more than anything else. Simply put. Use very high protein strong flour (15%’ish or more) in a bowl say 80% of flour volume with 20% light high protein rye flour into a bowl and mix with water at the highest hydration you can simply using a scraper to combine and no more. Start with say 70%. So 1kg of flour mix with 700ml water with salt and yeast. Put it in the fridge and forget it for a day or more. Don’t worry that you know you can’t handle it because you will be using baguette tins and so you will get the baguette shape. Then pull off and a couple of in-bowl stretches and put in a perforated baguette tin and bake in an oven with some steam. I’ll happily explain how to add steam simply to make what will be a domestic oven into a French bread oven. I mean not to teach anyone how to do anything only just share what I have learned by myself having been overwhelmed be black-art rubbish from experts wishing to make “their art” into something that no one else can do. It’s all largely BS. Making extraordinary bread is really, really easy if you ignore almost everything you read and learn from people who want to make it seem like their bread comes from their magic. I have overstepped the topic but happy to add any pictures and my own journey from baguettes, through bagels through pizza and even onion byalis etc etc and don’t start me on flatbreads …. Dough isn’t just for early morning munchies or for experts … even peasants like me can do it.. Every single person reading this thread can make a baguette better than anything they have ever tasted in France. Jeff

Does any Cooler remain that is still of a doughy disposition? 🥸 I still keep some boxes of dough in the fridge for those early morning munchy requirements. Wifey’s eyes start drooping at 1am’ish and so I’m left to the log fire and streaming TV, ……. and the draw of the dough. So I reach into the fridge and pull off a handful of dough and flatten it out and make a small pizza enough for three or four mouthfuls. They are not elegant or sophisticated, but when the pizza beckons it is best not to resist. And do believe me … the dough with a “less is more” topping does hit the mark. The current boxes are so energetic they have been trying to liberate themselves from their boxes even though they are in a cold fridge. And they are 5 day sour-dough-lite. This will all seem very weird to those that love dough, but they are 75% Caputo 00 long ferment (blue bag) flour and 25% Caputo fine ground Semolina ….. with … wait for it 100% hydration. Plus a large shot of Berio Rustica cloudy unfiltered extra virgin oil, some course Marldon sea salt, yeast and topped with some rustic passata with oregano some sugar and salt and some hard mozzarella and a mushroom. All of this is deeply boring to those that are untainted by dough obsession. But as things are currently so depressing here in the Homeland I thought I’d share a picture of my lonely singleton-pizza that with a large jug of rustic Puglia lifted the spirits beside the fire. Jeff x

What joy! I do so hate to feel I prattle on about the square root of nothing at all amongst all the funnies et al. .... but isn't it a wonderful Cooler landmark after all these years and this time to morph from the vurtual to the reality and that some who have been long term virtual Cooler cohorts have in fact eaten together in the real un-virtual world? Thanks muchly.