books and bread

 It was a good long weekend filled with books and bread.  I finished "A ship­wreck­ ­con­spir­a­cy: A Judge Mar­cus Flav­ius Severus Mys­tery in An­cien­t Rome" by local author and scholar of ancient Rome, Alan Scribner.  the eighth in his Severus series, these are always a good quick diversion, I enjoy when Alan writes about a custom or practice in ancient Rome that echoes the contemporary world, like chariot traffic jams. Or the Roman Senator character   has to  divest of his investments and property holdings because people in power are supposed to be free of business interests and the potential for profit and entanglement.  Sounds like emoluments to me: 

 Domestic Emoluments Clause: To preserve presidential independence further, the Clause provides that, apart from this fixed salary, the President shall not receive “any other Emolument” from the United States or any state government.  

And for something completely different, I am now onto "Red Dress in Black and White" by Elliot Ackerman, which promises to be a good read.  It is the story of an American woman married to a Turkish architect and business owner who wants to escape her marriage and finds that politics and the notion of possession are getting in the way.  Contemporary Turkey could be considered one of the main characters.  Good writing and a rich sense of place.  I'm struck by the fact that I don't really like the two protagonists and am wondering if that will get in the way of my reading.  Perhaps they will grow on me.  

And speaking of not liking characters, I am also listening to Edith Wharton's "The Custom of the Country" called "a scathing social commentary featuring the beautiful and manipulative Undine Sprague"--Undine wants nothing more than to be a part of high society.  Great writing, but a grating "heroine."

For Christmas, I got a package with a label from "old blue eyes"--I immediately thought of Frank Sinatra, but the eyes in question were Paul Hollywood's.  My daughter gave me one of his bread baking books since we have spent more than our fair share of time escaping into the "Great British Baking Show."  I started with the first recipe in the book, which PH says "if you can bake this, you can back anything in this book."  Well, duh, I had to start there.  See below--quite beautiful!:

Note to self:  if a bread is referred to as a "display bread" you should NOT plan to try to have it with dinner.  Inedible and intended to be so. I should have known better.  The next night's  bread was delicious however, a kind of fougasse.