Weeknotes 4
-
When I was 16 or 17, a former teacher busted us for drinking beers in the park at the end of my road. He was walking his dog and (rightly) scolded us for leaving litter and for generally being a nuisance. In 1651 the Roundheads stormed and captured the fortification on that hill, turning the cannons onto the Royalists who had retreated into the city. John Adams described it as “the ground where liberty was fought for” when he visited with Thomas Jefferson in 1786, “all England should come in pilgrimage to this hill once a year”.
I can’t quite believe the second and third presidents of the United States said that about the little hill at the end of my road, and that I’d never heard about it until I was 33.
I’ve started on a bit of a history kick this week, doing a (self guided) Battle of Worcester walking tour. I’m re-listening to the first series of the brilliant Revolutions podcast by Mike Duncan and ordered The World Turned Upside Down by Christopher Hill. I hope the lockdown restrictions are (safely) lifted before we move on again so we can go for a drink in the King Charles. I need recommendations for books or films or documentaries – please let me know if you have any!
-
Perhaps of greater world-historic significance: I reckon I’ve near-perfected the pizza-without-a-pizza-oven technique. I use Jim Lahey’s no knead pizza dough recipe, and then the hob (burner) and grill (broiler) cooking method. Home ovens apparently don’t get hot enough to bake pizza properly, and this method means there’s no need for a pizza stone/steel and peel.
Until fairly recently, I considered pizza one of the things that shouldn’t be made at home – it travels so well in a cardboard box, it’s like it was designed from the outset to be delivered – but this method is so easy and the results so good that I actually think it competes. With a bit of luck and a hot enough grill, you can even get some just about passable leoparding.