🍞Brilliant baking from Margot, and Bea’s + part 5 of our food photography class 📸

🍞Explore baking this summer & save 25% on ckbk subscriptions!🍰

Sweet and savoury sourdough treats from London's Margot Bakery

We have couple of gorgeous bakes newly risen from the ckbk oven—two books guaranteed to have you mastering the technicals and whipping up a showstopper.

“The baking at Margot is not always easy to define: our influences range from the fresh bold flavours found in Australian food, comforting recipes from the north of England to traditional Italian baking techniques and Polish and Hungarian fillings; we bake for both Jewish and Christian festivals.

“Sourdough doesn’t belong to a single culture or country and in opening the bakery as a self-taught baker and as a woman, I believe that I have something worthwhile to offer in baking bread – as much as a bakery with a long illustrious history or a baker using a one-hundred-year old sourdough starter. A lack of experience or one’s gender or a lack of equipment need not be a barrier to baking bread.

“Our bread is not always perfect, but my priority has always been, and will always be, quality. And with passion and determination I sincerely believe anyone can make good bread.” Michelle Eshkeri

In Modern Sourdough: Sweet and Savoury Recipes from Margot Bakery, baker Michelle Eshkeri sets out the story and a hugely tempting selection of bakes from the hugely popular bakery she founded in North London in 2016. As Michelle writes eloquently in the book’s introduction, her approach is that of someone self-taught, and focused on quality. As such this book is a real gift for the home baker.

The book is a love letter to sourdough baking, with exceptional guidance as to how to get started (excuse the pun) and the many diverse bakes you can then make with your starter. Bakes go far beyond the expected loaf—although you will find many, from a Baguette to a Sourdough Challah.

Michelle says this about sweet sourdough, “Complex and varied and delicious; even when it is perfectly sweet, it has a tang and depth that is like no other sweet bread in the world.”

Find recipes for Babka, Apple, Raisin and Rosemary Bread, Doughnuts, Sourdough Rye Brownies, and many more.

Find all 86 recipes from Modern Sourdough

Pictured above: Blueberry Bundt with Fondant Icing from Modern Sourdough by Michelle Eshkeri

It’s a Sweet World at Bea’s Bakery

“As we say in Yiddish, Bea’s has got gantse megile, or the whole thing, and with this marvellous cookbook, the best of Bea’s is available to everyone, especially those who live too far to drive to Tarzana. Rejoice, celebrate, and bake! The recipes you’ll find on the following pages might seem like they are for cookies and coffee cakes and other delicious things, but they are really recipes for hugs and kisses and smiles and expressions of love that make me happy there’s a Bea’s in this world.” Ziggy Gruber

Originally opened in 1968, Bea’s Bakery is a California institution, and part of the rich tradition of Jewish bakeries across the US. Now run by Lenny, the son of a Hungarian baker, and Adaeze, his Nigerian wife, the bakery is both a local institution and a place with global references which they share through their heartfelt bakes and in their new book It’s a Sweet World: Recipes From Around the Globe at Bea’s Bakery.

Try custard filled Napoleons, lightly spiced Nigerian Cornbread, or Apple Noodle Krugel.

Hooked on Baking? Explore our Baking bookshelf

Our iPhone photography class: part 5, Food Styling & Storytelling

We’re back with the next in our series for all you keen food photographers.

Here is the fifth part of our iPhone photography course. Expert Rupa Nagamootoo’s series—Food Photography with Rupa: 7 Steps to Standout Food Content—offers brilliant tips to hone your food photography skills using just your phone.

This week’s topic is Food Styling & Storytelling, those crucial things that grab a viewer’s interest.

So read on to learn how to show your food’s best side, what garnishes are good, and when is mess photogenic or just, well, mess.

Food Photography with Rupa: Part 5 - Food Styling & Storytelling

Ingredient focus: apricots

The apricot is a fruit belonging to the rose family and closely related to the plum, peach, cherry and almond. Originating in China, apricots are now grown throughout the warm, temperate parts of the world. Fully ripe fresh raw apricots are a true joy, fragrant and tender-fleshed, with a fine balance of sweetness and acidity. The fruit can be deceptive, as they reach a glorious orange before fully ripe, and before their flavor has developed.

Dried apricots are among the best dried fruits—they should be dried when fully ripe, in order that they have the maximum flavor. Fresh and dried, the fruits are good in many cooked dishes, sweet and savory—try this Lamb Tagine with Apricots. Cooking is also a very good way to make the most of any picked apricots that haven’t fully ripened.