Making the perfect bread with artisan baker and judge of the Great British Bake Off, Paul Hollywood

Admittedly I was nervous. This was my first food blogging event and I'd certainly never made bread with a celebrity chef before, least of all THE BREAD MAN - Paul Hollywood. He is to bread what Nigella is to chocolate. He was cool, calm, charismatic and funny, bread clearly makes him happy.

After five minutes of waiting anxiously we were called to our stations with Paul facing us. We each had a bowl with the bread making ingredients. Paul kicked off by demonstrating the perfect mixing technique, shaping our hands like claws, he encouraged us to dig deep into the mixture and we began to create our dough. After two minutes, I was wrist deep in the thick, gooey stuff, looking for a way out but Paul told me it wasn't time yet.

Whilst we were mixing Paul let us in on a few little secrets about bread. I never knew there were so many types and techniques and apparently, men are better at kneading than women - it's all in the shoulders he said. I hoped I would impress him with my kneading technique when the time came.

And after mixing for ten minutes, finally it was time to knead. Paul demonstrated the kneading technique of a god, I tried to copy enthusiastically but after a few minutes I had a feeling my rival, a guy- to my left, was stealing my thunder. I tried harder but alas after vigorously kneading for a little while longer it was time up.
Paul laughed and chatted as he came round to inspect our dough balls, he seemed suitably satisfied that we were good pupils. Prompted only by a few voices in the crowd who shouted 'Whose is the best?", he inspected our dough balls before announcing that my rival did in fact had the best dough ball in the house!

No matter I thought. I am a gracious loser. I even managed to squeeze five minutes of Paul's time to get a picture with him and my dough ball before making my with him before making my departure. I thanked him for an enlightening demonstration, he said I reminded him of someone. 'Who?' I enquired. 'Christine Bleakley', he said. Well, I was flattered and with a little hop, skip and a jump I floated out of there with my dough ball in tow.


You can find out more about The Science Of Baking workshop by visiting MOSI website or check out Paul's book 100 Great British Breads / http://www.paulhollywood.com/paul_hollywood_biography2.html.