Wednesday, July 11, 2007

New skills, new bills.

Hooray for floors. As I speak two men in karate headbands are installing floors in my living room and I couldn't be happier.

This week has hallmarked two new skills that I am trying to pick up. One is soughdough bread making and I have a frothy tangy smelling bit of dough that has sat on my counter for a week. I have fed the little guy daily and I made my first doughdough loaf this morning. My previous efforts in this vein were about a year ago and the resulting bricks were chucked off of my back porch into the woods. They probably remain their uneaten and hardened into some kind of bread rocks that the squirrels play on.

But today's first attempt was actually edible and I ate it with my cafe late this morning. (by the way I got this very tre chic white cafe set at the thrift store (2 dollars!!!) that I have been using in the morning for breakfast. One thing I love about sourdough bread is it rises overnight and so you can have fresh warm bread with your breakfast. Now don't delude yourself into thinking that I am some sort of master breadbaker as one of my two loaves was cheerfully chucked into the woods this morning to join his brethren from the previous year. The other loaf however was somewhat lighter and had a nice chewy crust. Still . . . I have a long way to go.

The other skill I am trying to pick up is hardly worth mentioning since I am picking it up so late in life I will no doubt be popular with nobody but my children before they reach the age of reason. But I have mastered three chords on the guitar and am attempting to learn to play it without sounding like a trasho faker.

oop gotta go. Ben needs the computer. I'll finish this later. . . .

5 comments:

Margaret E. Perry said...

whats the bills part?

one way to ensure crunchy crusts is to bake it in a cast iron dutch oven. See this:

http://kitchen.apartmenttherapy.com/food/news/bittmans-noknead-bread-phenomenon-014744

if you don't have one of these cast-iron dutch ovens already--you should totally get one. Besides the cast iron skillet they are the most versitle kitchen item I have ever owned. you can get them at ikea now, too!

Kelly said...

I've tried sourdough just once before, but I didn't even get as far as your first attempt. I tried a recipe that required lots of feeding and no yeast - it was supposed to make it's own natural yeast or something. Anyways, you'll have to share your recipe and tricks once you've perfected it.

Ben Hatke said...

I'm trying the same thing with growing the wild yeast. Yeah all the sources say that it is supposed to be really easy because human beings did it for like thousands of years. . . . it sure is tricky. Maybe I'm the cavewoman who would have died off from natural selection. . . .

Anonymous said...

oops that was me not ben

Anonymous said...

Anna: I tried a sour dough starter once and the thing turned into the monster from outer space! It overflowed the pan and dripped all down the shelves of my pantry. I would like to try it again, but, I'm telling you..that stuff scared me. One more day and it would have climbed the stairs and overtaken us in our beds.
Mama