Natural Tucker

Elizabeth David's Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen was my first cookbook of my own.

Natural Tucker by John Downes was my eventual stock and standard and I made a small fortune (by my expectations) at markets with the Hot Cross Bun recipe. From John Downes however I learned the skill of making chapatis, but rendered aware of the potential of eccentricity to enliven writing that he described the chapati dough was ready when its texture was that of an earlobe (if you had one).

I learned that to finish the chapati you cooked from a stack of pre-rolled rounds stored and separated from the next by slightly moistened cotton cloth, you picked the chapati up out of the pan it was basically cooked in and transferred it to the bare elements of the cooktop or hotplate heated to the highest temperature so the dough literally seered on one side immediately before it was as immediately turned to the other and it puffed.

Delicious that a sprinkle of raw and partly crisped wholemeal flour always ends in a nutty trail around the cooktop preparing chapatis by the method (I mean nutty in the nicest possible way).