Baking up a book of dreams

I’VE been having hours of fun with an old recipe book, so much so that one day I ended up bent double and laughing out loud in a deserted car park.

“An old recipe book” hardly does it justice. It’s the Be-ro Book of

Self Raising and Plain Flour Home Recipes, 34th edition.

I’d almost forgotten it existed but somehow it had survived periodic culls of my bookcase and, as retirement and lockdown conspired to fill my days with idleness, I stumbled across it and rediscovered the appeal that had made it a household favourite when I was a boy.

My love affair with cooking had waned considerably in that time. Countless celebrity recipe books had come and gone, consigned to the charity shop out of frustration over tortuous recipes that required a week’s grocery spend.

The beauty of the Be-ro book is its simplicity. Only a few basic ingredients are needed and if you follow the recipes you can’t go wrong. You’ll see what I mean if you try one of my favourites at the foot of this column. It grew out of the wholesale grocery empire set up in Newcastle in 1880 by Thomas Bell. His top-selling brands included Bells Royal self-raising flour but when it became illegal, after the death of Edward II, to use the Royal name, Bell abbreviated it to Be-ro. Self-raising flour was more expensive than plain and was regarded as something of a novelty, so in the 1920s the company staged a series of exhibitions to promote it, selling freshly baked cakes and scones for a shilling. Demand was so great that the book was born. Eighty pages long, little bigger than an iphone and now in its 41st edition, it has sold more than 40 million copies.

But back to my car park episode. I’d been making biscuits and had the Be-ro book open. Nearby sat my cheque book, a reminder that I had to pay in a cheque at the building society.

Biscuits baked and sampled, I drove into town, strode towards the building society, felt in my jacket pocket and realised I’d left the cheque book at home. Idiot! But never mind, the office was open for another 15 minutes, so I dashed back home, returned to the car park, felt in my pocket and pulled out… the Be-ro Recipe book. You might call that my melting moment… ■BE-RO MELTING MOMENTS Cream together two ounces of butter or margarine and 1½oz of caster sugar. Add half a teaspoon of vanilla essence, then 2½oz of self-raising flour and mix thoroughly. Divide into 12 pieces and roll each into a ball, using wet hands. Coat with desiccated coconut. Place on a greased baking sheet, pressing out slightly, and top each with a small piece of glace cherry. Bake at 165C for 15-20 minutes.