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  • Myrtle Allen’s Brown Bread

    This is such a fantastic bread for such low effort. It doesn’t require kneading, it can rise overnight in the fridge so you can bake it fresh in the morning, and the combination of molasses with the wholemeal flour is so tasty. Next time I’m going to use a smaller loaf tin so I can get a higher rise – the original recipe recommends a 22cm x 12cm loaf tin.

    ingredients:
    3 3/4 cup wholemeal flour
    11 grams dry yeast
    2 cups warm water
    2 tblsps molasses
    1 tblsp salt

    Put half a cup of warm water in a bowl, and stir in the yeast and molasses. Leave for 10 minutes or so until it foams up a little. Add in another half cup of water, then stir in the flour and salt. Add around one further cup of warm water gradually until you’ve made a wet, sticky dough – I needed around 3/4 of a cup. Spoon the dough into an oiled bread/loaf tin. Cover the tin and then either:
    a) put it in the fridge to rise overnight, which is what I did, or
    b) set in a warm spot and allow to rise by one-third of its original size.

    Heat up your oven to 230C, and bake the bread for 50 minutes, when it should be nicely browned and sound hollow when tapped. Tip the loaf out of the pan and onto a cooling rack to give a crustier finish. I think I waited about 15 minutes before cutting into the loaf for warm bread and butter, but I expect if you have a bit more discipline, you should probably wait until it cools properly.

  • 11 December – Coventry Carol

    Herod the King, in his raging, charged he hath this day;
    His men of might, in his own sight, all children young, to slay.

    Annie Lennox’s version of this carol is intensely powerful, which suits the subject matter – Coventry Carol dates from the 16th century, and is a lullaby sung by mothers to their children ordered by Herod to be killed.

  • Cashew & Date Biscuits

    Chewy wholemeal biscuits studded with cashews or dates – or whatever combination of dried fruit and nuts you prefer. I adapted them fairly heavily from Dan Lepard’s blueberry choc chip cookies. Next time I think I’ll reduce the sugar a bit even more, or use one of those less sweet alternative sugars, like coconut sugar. It was a good toddler-baking-assistant recipe – plenty of stirring involved.

    ingredients:
    100g softened unsalted butter
    25ml rice bran oil
    150g brown sugar
    1 egg
    1 tsp vanilla extract
    200g wholemeal flour
    ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
    good pinch of salt
    100g – 150g dried fruit, such as chopped dates
    100g cashews or other nutes
    75g rolled oats

    Heat up your oven to 170C (or 160C if it’s fan-forced). Chop up the nuts and dried fruit. Beat the butter, oil and sugar together with a spoon until smooth, then beat in the egg and vanilla extract. Add the flour, bicarb and salt, beat it in well, then stir in the dried fruit and nuts. It mixes up to a fairly damp dough.

    Line two biscuit trays. Scoop up spoonfuls of the biscuit dough and roll them into rough 2-3cm balls. Pass the balls to your toddler, and tell him or her to press them gently onto the biscuit tray. This instruction will be ignored. You may need to uncompress some of the biscuits a little before baking them for around 15 minutes, until they’re just started to brown at the edges. They’ll firm up as they cool, and you can transfer them to a cooling rack after 10 minutes or so.

  • 10 December – Chiron Beta Prime

    Merry Christmas from Chiron Beta Prime,
    Where we’re working in a mine for our robot overlords.
    Did I say overlords? I meant protectors.

    Jonathan Coulton released this song as part of his Thing a Week project, where he wrote and recorded a song each week for a year. It’s funny, with a hint of pathos, and I used it to kick off the 2011 Christmas mix.

  • 9 December – Carol of the Bells

    Gaily they ring, while people sing;
    Songs of good cheer, Christmas is here

    Hayley Westenra is a New Zealand singer, and this track was from her 2009 Christmas album, Winter Magic. Carol of the Bells was composed in 1904, and Wikipedia says helpfully that it’s based on a folk chant known in Ukrainian as “Shchedryk”. I really love the repeating bell-like motif.

  • 8 December – Holy, Holy, Holy

    Holy, holy, holy! All the saints adore Thee,
    Casting down their golden crowns around the glassy sea

    Another track from Sufjan Stevens’ collection of Christmas music, included in the 2010 mix CD. More of a general hymn, I think, rather than a specifically Christmassy song.

  • 7 December – Hark The Herald Angels Sing

    Joyful, all ye nations rise
    Join the triumph of the skies

    Acapella group Straight No Chaser recorded this medley of Hark The Herald Angels Sing and Angels We Have Heard On High, and I included it on the 2010 Christmas mix.

  • 6 December – Christmas Time

    The sleigh bells are in time ringing true;
    How we cling each Noel to that snowflake’s hope in hell
    that it won’t end

    This is an enjoyably crazy song from The Darkness that I used as the first song in the 2010 mix.

  • 5 December – Winter Song

    This is my winter song, December never felt so wrong;
    Cause you’re not where you belong, inside my arms

    This was written and recorded by Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson that I included on the 2009 mix. Wikipedia rather amusingly says that it became a very minor hit in Canada in 2008. When you look up the lyrics, they include several paragraphs of “bum bum bum bum”, which, for future reference for people transcribing lyrics, I do not believe is entirely necessary.

  • 4 December – All That I Want

    And when the night is falling, down the sky at midnight;
    Another year is stalling, far away a goodbye, good night

    I really like The Weepies’ style of gentle folk, and included All That I Want on my 2009 Christmas mix CD. It’s a track from their first album, Happiness.