Bread file
As Tom and Henry Herbert launch their first cookbook to accompany their hit Channel 4 TV series, The Fabulous Baker Brothers, ROSA PARK examines the brothers’ appeal and why they might be the greatest thing since sliced bread . . .
Peace and Loaf
Henry (left) and Tom Herbert, in front of their Chipping Sodbury butchery and bakery, which are next door to one another
books laden with jargon foreign to the novice baker, discussing the differences between a biga and a poolish, when all I really want to know is how to make a simple loaf at home. EnterThe Fabulous Baker Brothers. This new cookbook from Tom and Henry Herbert – the brothers from the beloved Cotswold-based Hobbs House Bakery and Butchery and the hit Channel 4 TV series after which the book is named – makes bread making accessible and fun. As Henry says, “It’s just mixing stuff!” Tom adds, “We want to take the fear out.” Their recipes, which celebrate bread
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and all the tasty things that accompany it, are models of clarity and simplicity and reading them makes me feel at home. The brothers understand simple pleasures (fish finger sarnies, bread
hen did bread become so complicated? There are too many bread
sauce with roast chicken, beef stew) and how to give them the modern tweaks that home cooks want, like sourdough pancakes with poached fruit and crème fraiche. “We’ve had a lot of practice – I’ve had ten years of teaching bread making courses and Henry is like a recipe machine. We are translating that to what people want at home,” Tom explains. As I make my way through the
book, I realise that it reads less like a cookbook and more like a recipe for a delicious life. From the introduction to the descriptive headnotes, every page in this colourful tome is interlaced with secrets of the naturally fermented kind alongside family history (their grandfather used to sleep on the overnight dough bin) and personal anecdotes (Henry sometimes uses a chocolate cake to get out of trouble with the missus). I soon discover that a BLT done right is a thing to behold and devour, and a great beef wellington can be mind blowing – especially with
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foie gras. I appreciate the blokish element to the book too – there’s a “Things men like to make” chapter – as it’s a reflection of who the boys are and their banter. By the book’s end, I not only want to
eat at Tom and Henry’s dinner table, but I want to be seated next to them as well (apologies in advance to the two Mrs. Herberts). I want to ask them if bagels will make a cameo in their next cookbook, inquire what their father thinks of their TV show, and then, after a couple of drinks, ask why they sign off with “Peace & Loaf.” Luckily, I got to meet the brothers
(albeit as a journalist rather than as a dinner guest) at Topping and Company’s event earlier this month for the launch of their book, and had a chance to witness their charm and passion for food in person. Tom tells me that Hobbs House Bakery is building a cookery school in Chipping Sodbury with hopes of training the next generation of bakers, and Henry
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