When I made these, I wasn’t that pleased with them, thinking that the outside should be crisper and the centre less dense. But then Hannah, my daughter, who’s been to Berlin twice, told me that they are just like the ones she bought there. My judgement was based on ignorance rather than knowledge!

Even so, I now leave them to rise a little after shaping and before boiling. I’ll also try different toppings: poppy seeds, sesame, celery seeds, etc. These use bicarbonate of soda – really traditional ones use lye – yes, believe it or not, they use caustic soda in commercial production.

I’m a bit ‘on the fence’ when it comes to pizza dough. I quite like this dough, but I also like a higher hydration dough that gives a base with larger air holes. This one is easier to handle, though.

In fact, I really don’t know why I’m writing about making pizza dough; Paul is so much better at it than I am. Hopefully, he will post about some of his pizzas in due course.

We have a small garden and grow tomatoes every summer. They taste so much better than shop-bought. We’ve got a few too many at the moment and as we’re out of bread it made sense to try and kill two birds with one stone. I was thinking along the lines of focaccia but then thought I’d have a play.

In 2013, I wrote:

It’s quite amazing how certain foods are so local that even though you live in the County bordering those where they’re made you’ve managed to get to 56 years old without ever having them.

The Derbyshire or North Staffordshire oatcake is such a one; it wasn’t until about 6 weeks ago, on a visit to Hartington, that I had tasted my first oatcake. I’ve hardly stopped eating them ever since!