Riddle

Riddle Bread is an old Lancashire recipe.  I use a slightly modified version.
Mix 50% roughly ground porridge oats with 50% strong white flour and add a sachet of dried yeast granules.  Make into a dough with a little warm water and milk and leave to prove for an hour or so.  Kneed to a stiff dough and roll out into pizza sized rounds.  Press a steel skewer systematically across the dough, pressing firmly to give a pattern similar to that of the mesh of a garden riddle.  Prove for half an hour and bake for 15 minutes in a moderately hot oven.  Cool on a tray.

The flat bread will break easily along the depressions, so you can hank off as much as you want.  Traditionally, the grooves are filled with butter and the bread is eaten with strong ale.  This is pre-Victorian pub grub.  Cold meats (for the wealthy) , pickles or cheeses (for the poor) would be used to accompany this bread.

Earlier in the week we walked around the lake at Trentham in the warm sun.  Miss Elizabeth had an engine problem and she was being towed back to her moorings by a speedboat with its outboard engine in reverse.  To my recollection, this is a first time that the service has been compromised.  This is a very reliable ferry boat.