Reynard
Guru
- Location
- Cambridgeshire, UK
Is it really that ghastly?
Home made pizza base ideas wanted (and toppings).
- Thread starter Dave7
- Start date
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Is it really that ghastly?
- Location
- London
Pretty. A lot of it strikes me as something between fluffy and rubbery. Softness seems to be much preferred and promoted in much of their stuff and I presume that this was the reason one of their loaves I saw had 11 per cent fat. It came as news to me that it was possible to get that much fat into bread. Mulino Bianco promoted itself heavily from the 80s with rural idyll ads showing, yes you gussed it, a small mill. In reality their stuff clearly comes from a large factory or test tube. To be avoided. Then there is the real horror of much of the bread used in the tramezzino, a term coined by D'Annunzio as a suitably italian fascist butty. Inexplicably it lives on.
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glasgowcyclist
Charming but somewhat feckless
- Location
- Scotland
When I was in Sorrento last year, our hotel offered a wide-ranging breakfast and dinner buffet. The majority (98% I'd guess) were Brits, the remainder from elsewhere in Italy. Only the Brits ate the horrible mass-produced bread we all recognise from the supermarket, while the Real Bread was at the end of the counter in big baskets where you chose your favourite and cut yourself a nice crusty slice of pane a legna from the local panificio.
Reynard
Guru
- Location
- Cambridgeshire, UK
I guess people want the convenience of soft sliced bread...
Have had good bread in the past from a traditional Italian deli before it changed owners. Old Mr Gallo used to sell those lovely big rounds of white bread with a floured crust and a semi-open crumb. Was amazing when fresh with butter and torta di dolcelatte, when it got a little stale, it made the most lovely toast.
Sliced loaves can have quite a bit of fat in them; milk, milk powder, oil, shortening etc Not talking about fruit loaves or brioche here, just ordinary bread. It's one of the reasons that sliced loaf is more calorific per slice than home baked bread. I usually pop a couple of tablespoons of oil in my bread just to make it keep a bit better.
Have had good bread in the past from a traditional Italian deli before it changed owners. Old Mr Gallo used to sell those lovely big rounds of white bread with a floured crust and a semi-open crumb. Was amazing when fresh with butter and torta di dolcelatte, when it got a little stale, it made the most lovely toast.
Sliced loaves can have quite a bit of fat in them; milk, milk powder, oil, shortening etc Not talking about fruit loaves or brioche here, just ordinary bread. It's one of the reasons that sliced loaf is more calorific per slice than home baked bread. I usually pop a couple of tablespoons of oil in my bread just to make it keep a bit better.
- Location
- London
Yes i do like that stuff. Used to have a favourite panificio I would often cycle to at 4 in the morning. Has now shut unfortunately, though it always did look shut for for decades if you were there much after noon.
Reynard
Guru
- Location
- Cambridgeshire, UK
Bought 250g of sliced chorizo for £1.19 on YS this afternoon, as well as cherry tomatoes at 23p a punnet and spinach at 26p a bag. I'm thinking that lot might have the makings of really nice pizza...
- Location
- London
I can recommend lidl's whole chorizo, the "premium" one. Quite often on weekend special offer, when I stock up. Long sell by date. Enjoy your YS bargains, took me a while to figure out what that meant.
Reynard
Guru
- Location
- Cambridgeshire, UK
Yep, I usually get my chorizo from Lidl as well. As with all things cured and smoked, it keeps well beyond the date on the packet. They do a pretty good serrano ham as well.
Have to confess to being an inveterate yellow sticker-er.
And yep, at that price, it all does taste a LOT better 
- Location
- London
Yep, I usually get my chorizo from Lidl as well. As with all things cured and smoked, it keeps well beyond the date on the packet. They do a pretty good serrano ham as well.
Have to confess to being an inveterate yellow sticker-er.
How much longer do you reckon with the likes of cured meat Reynard?
Lidl does lots of weekend near 50 per cent reductions on meat products and cheese so with careful buying and a decent fridge one can avoid many full prices. I have a stock of their sliced preserved German ham at the moment - tiny bits of it go into my pasta tomato sauce - I'm no purist.
Am afraid that my local sainsburys yellow sticker jobbies are now often an insult to the intelligence - 5 per cent off something up against the date. They must have got the clever/stupid marketing wonks in. Oh for the wonder days when I first moved here - not unknown for the offers to mate with each other and produce a minus zero total at the till - nice staff suggested I dash back into the shop to get some wine to bump it back above zero
Reynard
Guru
- Location
- Cambridgeshire, UK
About a year as long as you don't open the packet. You might get some salt deposit on the outside of sausages / salamis and around the edge of ham slices, but that's not an issue. Even smoked fish will keep well over the date as long as it's vac-packed.
Long shelf life (and no fridges) is basically the reason why stuff was smoked / salted in the first place - dates on some things are something of an irrelevance if stored correctly. Am afraid that my local sainsburys yellow sticker jobbies are now often an insult to the intelligence - 5 per cent off something up against the date. They must have got the clever/stupid marketing wonks in. Oh for the wonder days when I first moved here - not unknown for the offers to mate with each other and produce a minus zero total at the till - nice staff suggested I dash back into the shop to get some wine to bump it back above zero
Ah yes, I've been paid to take away stuff too.
I'm lucky, I can get good reductions in the stores that I frequent. Waitrose though, used to be really, really good until they extended their opening hours (they used to shut at 6pm, now open till 9pm), and now they don't mark down enough to make it worthwhile. Occasionally I *can* strike lucky in there, but I don't go there specially. I usually only drop in there for bread flour as they've got a better range than Tesco.YS is usually done at the discretion of the manager. A couple of so years ago the then manager in my local Tesco decided that she would rather waste the ISB products (bread, rolls, cakes, pastries, doughnuts) than mark them down. They used to have anything from half a dozen to a couple of dozen pink sacks of stuff that went straight in the bin most days.
- Location
- London
Many thanks reynard - you have revolutionsed my chorizo purchasing - should now be able to stock up to last between discounts - though you have to be careful how much processed meat you eat I believe.
Still some bargains at my local Sainsburys and I'm lucky in that I pretty much have to walk past it everytime I go out/return so no special trips needed. I do buy a fair bit of bread there for freezing - they used to discount their really really nice loaves but they now send it to feed to pigs or to burn rather than let the staff or customers have it. Which at the end of the day is ultimately rather stupid of them.
Still, back to pizzas
Still some bargains at my local Sainsburys and I'm lucky in that I pretty much have to walk past it everytime I go out/return so no special trips needed. I do buy a fair bit of bread there for freezing - they used to discount their really really nice loaves but they now send it to feed to pigs or to burn rather than let the staff or customers have it. Which at the end of the day is ultimately rather stupid of them.
Still, back to pizzas
Reynard
Guru
- Location
- Cambridgeshire, UK
YVW @Blue Hills
Everything is fine in moderation - including moderation
I live right out in the boonies, so groceries (and yellow stickering) involves a dedicated trip. My nearest Lidl is in March, 20-something miles away... The exception is the Co-op, which I pass regularly when I'm out on the bike, so it's no trouble to duck in to see what's to be had.
Was thinking of making pizza later this week, but the latest magazine from the Co-op has a recipe for spanakopita
Everything is fine in moderation - including moderation
I live right out in the boonies, so groceries (and yellow stickering) involves a dedicated trip. My nearest Lidl is in March, 20-something miles away... The exception is the Co-op, which I pass regularly when I'm out on the bike, so it's no trouble to duck in to see what's to be had.
Was thinking of making pizza later this week, but the latest magazine from the Co-op has a recipe for spanakopita
- Location
- London
If I eventually get round to sorting my junk I will try to find the handwritten homemade pizza recipe I was given by an Italian pizza mistress. Though I caution that it is somewhat involved.
- Location
- London
oo, posh
Where I live there are several within a short cycle, and several Aldis. Spoilt for choice.
(note - light joke - things can be heavy online)
Oh if you are a Lidl fan I can recommend their strong cider - not the cheap fizz, the one at the dizzy heights of £1.15 for a half litre bottle. Called "vintage" I think. It's usually quite low down on the shelves to help its fans crawl towards it. Should go down well with a home made pizza of a summer evening.
