campfire cooking as a village

our experiments with baking berry bread & making berry jam…

one of our favourite things of late has been to have a cooking project such as this berry bread baking which went down a treat with our groups who met over the summer.

this is wonderful experience where the whole group works together as a villiage to create something that we then enjoy feasting on all together at the end of the day. in the morning we allocate roles - wood choppers, kindling collectors, fire builders & lighters, bakers and foragers.

the blackberries came early this year so we decided to make a seasonal bread with them to celebrate this time of year with the grain, fruits of late summer/early autumn and the last harvests. we also used the berries to make jam! there have also been an abundance of nettle seeds on our site which we learnt how to identify (the female seeds look very similar to the male flowers so you have to know what you are looking for) and to pick without being stung. nettle seeds are highly nutritious and energy giving so we folded into the dough and sprinkled on top for some extra panache!

recipe for campfire berry bread

ingredients

• 450g strong white bread flour

• 100g blackberries

• 1 tsp salt

• 1 easy bake yeast sachet

• 4tbsp berry jam

• 3 tbsp butter or coconut oil

• 115ml water

• 115ml plant based or dairy milk

directions

step 1: put the flour, blackberries and salt into a bowl and sprinkle the yeast over

step 2: mix to a soft dough with the jam, butter/coconut oil, water and milk

step 3: turn onto a floured surface and knead for 10 minutes

step 4: shape as desired and put into a greased dutch oven

step 5: leave to prove until double in size. meanwhile, light the campfire and keep it burning until there is a bed with plenty of hot embers

step 6: place bread in the preheated oven either on a grill or directly onto the embers and bake for 25-30 minutes

step 7: cool on a wire rack before slicing