Bun in the oven

A few weeks ago when I was in Dhaka, I bought a second-hand oven from one of the AYADs who was leaving.  I'd been thinking about getting an oven ever since my visit to Rajshahi in May, where I stayed with Nadege and her bread-baking housemate.  It opened up a whole new world of possibilities - bread, roast vegies, cakes, biscuits...  Given that I'm really not a fan of the bread you can buy here (the standard bread is really sweet and more like cake than bread) I don't know why I even hesitated to buy an oven - $50 for a new one is a small price to pay for the happiness it could bring.  Nevertheless I did hesitate... long enough for Paul to send an email advertising the various household goods up for sale cos his assignment was finishing and it was time for him to shesh the 'desh.  (Shesh is Bangla for "finish" but has become an everyday part of speech in many different ways including as a verb.)  So I got it for the bargain price of about $34.  Yay!

I've never made bread by hand before.  It always seemed like something that was too hard.  But, as I'm discovering, it's really as easy as pie.  Easier, in fact!  I've found a good recipe that doesn't taste too yeasty.  I get wholemeal flour, which is so exciting as it's a bit of a hassle to find brown bread outside Dhaka (although it's recently become available in Chittagong).  So the whole process takes a couple of hours, but the individual steps aren't too time consuming and the end result is soooooooo worth it.

Having mastered plain brown bread, I've started experimenting a little.  I made some herb and garlic bread the other night (with herbs lovingly sent from Australia - thanks Pirca!).  Nadege (another AYAD) and her husband, Ash, came to visit so we made some date and coconut bread yesterday which went down a treat for breakfast today.  I've just now taken another plain brown loaf out of the oven, see:

I can't even begin to describe how exciting it is to eat the bread, especially fresh out of the oven.  It takes considerable will-power to leave some for later!  I've also been loving myself sick eating roast potatoes and pumpkin and a local variety of eggplant.  Overall, my happiness rating has shot off the scale...  Definitely a good investment.