Amongst other things, Nic is a writer and director for theatre and film...
... so doesn't have a lot of time to update this site.
You will need: 500g of flour (wholemeal is a good choice), 350ml of tepid water, around 25g of sesame seeds, 1.5 teaspoons of yeast, salt, sugar, a few teaspoons of oregano to taste.
In a small bowl, set aside 50ml of the water and stir in the yeast and a teaspoon or so of sugar.
Crush the sesame seeds with a mortar and pestle. This will release flavour. Keep a pinch of the whole seeds aside to top the dough before baking.
Pour the flour into a mixing bowl along with the crushed sesame seeds, the oregano and a pinch of salt. Mix well.
Make a hollow in the flour and pour in the yeast, sugar and water mixture. Start to stir, adding the rest of the water until you have a consistent dough.
Turn the dough out onto a floured counter-top or work surface and begin to knead.
Talk to the dough. Explain that you have paid over the odds for the ingredients, even though you bought the cheapest you could find. Explain how you could buy a mass-produced loaf of bread for half the price - less - but it would not be as good. It would be soulless and filled with chemical substitutes for the wholesome nutrition we need if we are to live as human beings and not automatons. A false bread, mixed by machines and wrapped in toxic plastics. Yet it would be cheap. Explain why you think this is ridiculous and what it says about the state of the world we live in.
You should work the dough for a few minutes, in order for the gluten to bind. Use this time to pour out your heart to the dough. It will not interrupt you. If the dough becomes too dry, use your bitter tears to moisten it a little more. Do not become angry. Do not shout at the dough.
After a few minutes, set the dough aside to rest for a time.
If you smoke, or abuse pharmaceuticals to escape the pain for a brief, blissful moment, you may do so now.
After having left the dough to its own devices, return to kneading it again. This is called knocking back but it is not violent; merely resigned. Knead the dough for a much shorter time, i.e. until you can no longer bear the crushing weight of your own despair.
Place the dough into a non-stick bread tin and gently press it down to cover the entire base. You may cast the remaining whole sesame seeds across the top of the dough like the ungerminated seeds of your own hopes and dreams.
Place a humid cloth over the bread tin and leave the dough aside to rise. At a minimum you will need around 3-4 hours for it to rise but an excellent, light consistency can be attained if you leave it over night.
If you intend to leave the dough to rise overnight, go to bed. Lie in the darkness. Listen to the irregular thudding of your own plaintive heartbeat as doubts and unnamed fears scurry through your mind and the encroaching blackness that surrounds you becomes swollen with half-seen faces looming towards you, crying out eternally silent words of advice that you wish you had heeded so many years ago.
Now your dough has risen be careful not to jolt the bread tin - it may collapse. It is precarious. Teetering on the brink.
Heat the oven to 200 degrees centigrade. Don't pre-heat the oven. That is ridiculous and defies fundamental laws of time and causality. How can you heat something before you have heated it? Just heat it. When it reaches 200C you will be able to cook with it; not before. The word 'pre-heat' is meaningless and your use of it reveals a great deal. Your ceaseless desire to rush to the climax of everything in your life is what causes you such existential pain. Why do you torture yourself? Can you not simply be?
Place the bread tin in the middle of the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes. You can remove the bread from the tin and place it back into the oven for a further 5-10 minutes to brown the exterior. When it is cooked, tapping the bottom of the loaf will produce a hollow sound, like that of your own existence.
Wait for the bread to cool (it continues to cook as it does so) and enjoy with a rich butter spread and friends.
Or perhaps they are merely acquaintances.
