Flour - Fred, the Flour Dredger

I hated Cookery at school. Nothing ever worked out for me. The shortcake made that morning, of which I was so proud, arrived home as a mass of crumbs in my tin. I came last in my Third Year exam because I’d forgotten my very necessary egg. On another occasion I was ridiculed by the horrid Domestic Science teacher for my choice of crumble – banana. It was the only fruit available to me and at least I’d made an effort.  It worked and tasted fine with custard. Looking back, I don’t think she, or any of my teachers, was aware that my mother was terminally ill and I was looking after myself and the family when my grandmother couldn’t be there. Perhaps, she might have been more kind to me had she known. When the ‘O’ Level options were announced, she geared me towards needlework, not that I needed any help with my choice.  If I learnt anything about cookery at school, it was the importance of a flour dredger. It was the one thing I was going to have when I had my own kitchen.  Many years passed before that happened and a flour dredger wasn’t included.

From somewhere along the years I’ve mastered enough cookery skills to feed myself properly when I lived alone and raise my family on a well-balanced diet and some home-baked treats,  Christmas cake, birthday cake, biscuits, flapjack and bread. There’s usually something tempting by the bread bin.

As Covid 19 hit, a national shortage of all important things happened overnight. It wasn’t just toilet rolls and domestic cleaning items with the basic food stuffs, flour became impossible to find.  I was in Dumfries & Galloway as lockdown commenced and found an abundance of various flours in Kirkcudbright’s Co-op. I bought one packet of bread flour and one packet of plain flour to bring home. We came back into self-isolation, relying on shopping deliveries or family members picking things up for us. I told everyone to look for flour and buy me any sort, also baking powder, which had vanished from stock lists everywhere. Flapjack became the usual home bake as porridge oats and syrup were still easily available. I even blitzed some oats to make a flour suitable for melt-in-the-mouth oaty cookies. They were so successful, that I’d like to believe the nasty Domestic Science ma’am would have a tiny word of praise.  She will be quite old by now, possibly shaking her flour dredger in the next world.

I have lots of flour now, of all types, even some organic rye flour, ideal for making almond shortcake, according to the blurb on the packet. I had to try out the recipe and it is delicious, as my disappearing waistline can confirm.

Ah, flour dredger, a Fred one from Homepride. I’ll put it on my birthday list.

My poem,  Flour Shortage

And on the Home Baking aisle, shelves are bare,

Devoid of flour that's usu'lly there.

No bread flour, no self-raising, no plain,

Not even that fancy rye or whole grain.

The entire selection is out of stock

Because too many people ran amok

Filling their trolleys with endless supplies

Of bread and milk and beans and frozen pies.

And flour.

I brought some home from Scotland, back in March.

Some plain and some wholemeal flour, low starch.

I bake a lot and I like my own bread

Otherwise, Hovis is perfect, instead.

I use up my flour then need some more,

I'm shopping on-line like never before.

No rice, no pasta, no cheese? Human greed

Means there's no provision for what I need,

No flour.

Pamela Winning 2020

Thanks for reading, keep baking and keep safe, Pam x