New to Van Clarke? Subscribe to our newsletter for 15% off your first order. Start your haircare journey today.
January 01, 2019
While everyone was fighting over toilet rolls, I managed to bag a 16kg sack of flour. That became the next daily staple to disappear off the shelves in Lockdown. Luckily, just as I’m finishing it, supplies are returning.
My sister-in-law knows I love to bake and that I make our bread at home. She passed on this recipe as there is no kneading or proving, so it’s a really easy bread. The contrast of crusty outer with the soft, open, tumbling texture of the coarse grainy inner make for a totally delicious loaf.
Ingredients:
400gms white bread flour
175gms plain yoghurt
150gms Guinness
100gms wholemeal flour
60gms black treacle
50gms oats
40gms unsalted butter (cubed)
2 tsp salt
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
Method:
Preheat oven to 200⁰C
Prepare a baking tray with parchment paper. In a large bowl, incorporate both flours, oats salt and bicarbonate of soda. Add the butter and using your fingertips rub together into the dry ingredients until it resembles breadcrumbs. In a jug, mix the Guinness, yoghurt and treacle until it all comes together.
Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix everything until it just comes together, (don’t over work it!) Shape the dough into a ball, place on the prepared tray, dust liberally with flour, press down slightly and then with a sharp knife cut a cross into the top of the dough, (about an inch deep).
Bake for about 50 mins, until golden on top, and if knocked on the bottom, it sounds hollow.
Leave to cool on a wire rack.
Enjoy.
Gaby Van Clarke
July 19, 2025
Caramelised Spanish toast — or "Torrijas caramelizadas" — is a heavenly Spanish dessert that's especially beloved during Easter but enjoyed year-round for its rich, indulgent flavour and custardy texture...
July 18, 2025
You can fake it with the ‘head upside down and empty a can of hairspray’ trick, but I don’t recommend this. For volume that looks and feels natural and lasts, the following ideas help. The more techniques you use the more lasting the volume.
July 18, 2025