a little red hen

Two Breads, different outcomes: one small book

In a semi-organizing mood one day, I approached my shelves of recipe book for bread.  Some, like  Jean Hewitt's 1971, New York Times Natural Foods Cookbook, have other recipes.  A favorite was a simple "Crusty White Bread," an ersatz French bread, made with olive oil or clarified butter.  Many guests were once impressed.  

"Baba a Louis Bakery Bread Book" by John McLure, rarely mentioned among the bread bloggers, was one I purchased a few years ago in NYC but never used. The subtitle, "The Secret Book of the Bread," seemed to promise more than a slim volume might deliver.  I was about to be surprised by a delicious bread and a radical (for me), new approach for raising dough.

But first, an introduction to McLure and his bakery in Vermont.  He shared about a mysterious health condition and receiving a "chain cake," similar to a chain letter.  He was instructed to pass along some soured batter he'd been sent.  He used all of it to make a cake in the shape of an ahkh.

Then fed it to "our pet pig."  Okay, I could see why I'd put the book aside:  it did not mesh with my life in Manhattan.  It felt too 1960s and I needed to be more grounded.  Now, however, in Portland, Oregon, which sometimes feels as if it is levitating, I was more prepared for his secrets on "reversing the decline of bread."

Photo from his book illustrates McLure's method for creating a properly moist environment for the second rise of the dough.  The picture was important to show dough in a baking pan covered by an inverted baking pan.  I have no idea why the bread pan is elevated but do get that the pot on top was to keep the warmth inside.

My approach was to spray water inside the bottom of a deep roast pan(had to be high enough so loaves would not make contact as they expanded.  Covered it all with a dish towel tucked around all the open spaces.  Almost engineering.   

Open Sesame (a la Baba) was the "soured yeast" bread which did not use my own sourdough starter but:  

3 cups wheat flour

3-1/4 cups white flour

1-1/2 tsp active dry yeast

1-1/2 Tbsp sea salt

2 cups + 2 Tbsp water

...were mixed together to "form a nice firm ball of dough, placed in a covered bowl, left to rise for 12 hours. Resulting in a soured dough.  Earlier 3/4 cup of sesame seeds had been roasted.  After this long first rise, the dough was cut in half and seeds kneaded into each piece, shaped into round loaves, then put into the towel-covered cocoon above for several hours to double.  Coated with egg glaze, baked at 375 for 40 minutes.  Tasted so good, sesame seeds very subtle, long-lasting. 

Delighted with this one, I tried another McLure recipe, Peter's Grain Bread-- soaked oatmeal, bulghur, wheat flakes, sunflower seeds and millet.   Same method but did not a success.  Know what I need to do differently.  Will try again because I'm intrigued by the mix of ingredients.

Never learned the story-behind-the-story of ankh cake or how McLure moved past his health problem. Looking for information on the ankh, however, led straight to a blog by a gentleman in Harlem!  Back in my last neighborhood.  He has studied the  Secret of the Ankh, and believes it is "...not only a symbol of Life but the elements that create life."  Like bread.

 

 

 

Happy Cup, bread, politics: Little red hen's peripatetic days

Rye breads recently made where I neglected to label recipe source.  They were very good.  One on right is 1968 New York Times Sourdough via Craig Claiborne.

And what better to go with a slice of homemade bread than my newest political button.  Yes, 17% is the stunning percentage of women in Congress.  A special election in the quirky district where we live is about to (fingers crossed) give Democrat Suzanne Bonamici a seat in the House of Representatives.  She will replace an unsuitable man I wrote about at length HERE.

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MOM MARKETING,  is a pro bono effort on behalf of HAPPY CUP ; it is my very own "start-up" for 2012.  Timmy Straw, composer and musician, who works at the other wonderful Portland bookstore, Daedalus, in the Northwest, was the first person I tried the idea on.

She listened to my pitch (we are already acquainted).

Three years ago our daughter Rachel (at right) had the idea to open a coffee shop to provide more jobs and more social outlets for her clients with disabilities.  Full Life Coffee Shop quickly attracted other programs who bring their clients on outings to socialize--and drink coffee.

In late 2011, through a circumstance that could only occur in Portland, Rachel had an opportunity to develop a coffee roast.  Happy Cup joined the lively java scene overtaking  America (end of pitch).

Tee-shirt and  mug have been added.  Of course, proud parents tell the Happy Cup story, distribute this small, informative brochure.

As part of  Mom Marketing I give the listener  a sample package of coffee.  Next month:  Happy Cup debuts at Whole Foods in Portland.

 

 

Rye Bread as Doorstop!

When I fail, it may be an opportunity for ART...or HUMOR...anything to delay the moment of discard.   Vollkornbrot was destined to be too much of a reach for my sourdough ambitions and my teeny-tiny oven.

1996 was Year One of our First Retirement in New York City.  At Fairway perhaps, I saw a local bread labeled "Bread Alone."  Nice title, good to eat.  In a way similiar to restless, educated 20th century Manhattanites of a certain class--some money saved up (stockbroker, ad exec,) post-hippie (don't you like that better than "boomer"?), Daniel Leader left the City for upstate--the Catskills.

He opened an  organic, European-style bakery in Boice, N.Y.  Ten years later he wrote the book, "Bread Alone:  bold fresh loaves fom your own hands" with Judith Blahnik.  I bought it in the energetic early retirement, do-everything mode, and because I loved the cover illustration.  "Began sourdough rye starters,  potato & caraway seed, 2/29/96--whew!" a red pen notes inside the cover.  Have no memory of this nor what happened next.  All I recall is being put off by the heroics of Leader's techniques.

All these years later in Second Retirement, I'm prepared for all kinds of bread challenges--and less distracted by life in the Big Apple.

Using my own rye starter, in May, I returned to Leader's book for    "Sourdough Rye with Potato."   Challenged to fit three loaves in the oven, I used a medium-sized cast iron skillet and two black metal bread pans. (Have to reduce recipe next time.)  Thought it was a terrific loaf though labor intensive with huge amont of very wet dough.  Ron  lent a hand on kneading.  Quite tasty with pieces of potato which can be seen in the slices.

Last month, emboldened further, I took on Vollkornbrot, the doorstop pictured above.  "The name means 'whole kernel bread'...a tradition in Germany and Scandanavia" Leader writes.  It uses whole rye berries (soaked overnight), an ingredient that intrigued me, pumpernickel flour/rye meal that I substituted for cracked rye.

The detail in this book includes activities I ignore:  getting the correct temperature of your kitchen, flour, etc., taking the temperature of the dough after mixing.   Baked 2 1/2 hours in a 300-degree oven, as per instructions and "...rest at least 24 (or even 36) hours before eating."  Never got there.  As if to punish my girlish, do-it-my-way approach, the goddess of bread gave me the inedible result pictured at the beginning of this post.   

But there are others to try!  I am aided in my obessessive pursuit by an especially cool "summer" in Portland, Oregon.  I enjoy taking pictures of my production to keep track of what I've done.  It's a habit that takes me back to young parenting, particularly our intensely documented first child.

You're wondering, I suppose, what two old people trying to watch their girth do with all this largesse?  Invite us to dinner, we bring a loaf with us.  Neighbors where we live are always glad to share   and the freezer holds slices for non-baking weeks. 

An important goal now is to find a way or ways to give a loaf to someone I do not know, someone who might truly need it.  Been talking to people about how that might happen; that is where I hope my Kneading to Know idea will travel forward.

Glorious Rye Bread in the Oven

In my sourdough travels, many of my efforts have focused on rye breads.  Is it being Jewish, even so marginally, that turns me to the darker flour, the pungent taste.  Or the memory of my late, angry father who disparaged commercial white with the comment, "Punk bread." 

Since the spring, I've tried more recipes from  books long-owned, newly acquired, and a few found online.  The quintessence (link here to vegan, raw food  eatery so named) of the work came in a class at Bob's Red Mill back in May.   Alan Maniscalco who collaborated in opening  Ken's Artisan Bakery here in Portland has worked with Ken's to create what is a very popular pizza place.  You have to make careful plans to get a seat there; we have not mastered that yet.

However, we did get important immersion of rye breads under his direction.  Peasant bread--half of the dough with sunflower and flax seed plus millet and walnuts.  Excellent.  Another with currants.  One with pumpernickel flour (a/k/a cracked rye), and finally. 

All in two and a half hours!  Of course, Alan had helped it along by preparing the sourdough rye starters beforehand.  This was not an overnighter!  With two of us taking the class, we returned home with eight loaves of bread yet to be baked!  A particular challenge for the Blooms who only havea 20-inch stove.  You are impressed?  Our bread-making classmates were astuounded.

And this one is an improvement over the one we had when we moved in.  This one has a window and a light--slightly better temp control.  But it's all part of the challenge.  Generous neighbors have offered their larger ovens and I did take one up on it recently.

Serendipitously, our friend Toni was in a cheese-making class at same time we were excessing with making rye at Bob's.  Here's a recipe for her Primo sale, a light-tasting Silician cheese.  With her spouse Al, we had quite a feast--veggie dish for a little balance.  And, of course, sent them home with bread.

 

 

KNEADING TO KNOW, process/outcome/future

For the past month I've hoped that it would occur to me how to move the energy of public beadmaking to the next phase of its/my life.  

What had I learned? The dough I was kneading survived well and became, of course, another two loaves.     That it would be possible to carry around a bowful of indoors, outdoors, through the changing temperatures of Portland spring and have it survive as another loaf when it went into the oven.  Best French bread produced so far; perhaps made finer by many hours of travel and kneading!  Recipe was the "long method" from Sunset Cookbook of Breads.*

The flour and water in the jar also performed.  Wild yeast found its way there, as I'd told my audience it would.  Once returned to my kitchen, it produced another bread that connected me to another new recipe in an old paperback from my 20th century baking days.**

But I missed the chance to share that success with my class.  Would the students have appreciated a result that was harder to the touch and teeth than the other bread?  Would it have mattered?

Had I even made the point about the wonders of collecing wild yeast?

As personally satisfying as the entire venture had been, something was missing.  There had not been enough time to have a more meaningful exchange.  The ideal would have been to have others kneading the dough, to have more of an exchange between myself, between one another of people experiencing kneading.

Was it sufficient to mention world hunger in Manifesto #3 and have that make an impact on those who took the "Bread not Bombs" button?  Would anyone besides me wear the button?  Trying to do too much, not an unusual problem with my projects.

Here I am, the day after July 4, 2011.  The photo on the right marks the beginning of "Kneading to Know."  Meanwhile I've thought about venues for another performance--the Farmers' Markets are now in full season.  Would one of them be the right place...can I find others to do this with me?  Ron has volunteered to be another kneader...or two.

Meanwhile the bread adventure continues...more loaves ahead.

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 *1977 edition of this Sunset magazine book can be found through used book sites.

**Sourdough Raisin Casserole Bread from Rita Davenport's Sourdough Cookery (1980 paperback, out of print)

KNEADING TO KNOW goes public in Portland

Life went on.  In Street Art class, four students on my team offered feedback.  Maybe trying to use the "Music of Vegetables" CD  was not such a good idea.  Rozzell was determined that it had to happen outside.  The weather, I pleaded.  He smiled.

Suddenly, I looked at the calendar, realized it was about to be my turn to present.  Time speeded up.  Made a large

sourdough loaf, took a photo to display of rising sourdough in my fridge, selected an empty jar to be filled before the performance with flour and water (demo of how simple it was to catch "wild" yeast).

We met on the morning of April 27 in the PSU Food for Thought cafe.  Aside from the woman at our table, no one paid attention to our assembling the buttons and manifesto (designated a "zine" by one of the FFT people)...and the bowl of rising dough.

While I'd worried about where to find buttons, paper, etcetera, Rozzell knew that everything was available to students, where to find it.  His calm always impressed me since the class population struck me as very individualistic and not easily organized.  I'd never been taught by someone with an ever-present cap.

Nick and Kelly did most of the button-assembling work; I checked on the life of the rising bread dough and worried 
about weather.  Then I got comfortable with different colors of button (not sepia) and shape of zine than I'd visualized.  Collaboration changes things.

At the usual afternoon class time, Ron arrived to take pictures and I marveled once again at the inaccessibility of the Urban Center Plaza, an architectural mish-mosh near the trolley that cuts through campus.  

Nick held the mike.  I read  KNEADING TO KNOW text and kneaded.  Kelly and Maryann (yellow boots) distributed
the buttons.  Rozzell sliced bread.  People ate bread.  A happening shrouded in mist.

All the aprons were vintage except this one with green peas from last year's PSU Farmers' Market.  Details like this become too-large for me in performance.

John, who often carried this "Free Conversation," sign also helped out.  His message  pre-dated Kneading to Know.  Always meant to ask him about responses to his invitation.  Things moved quickly, everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves and ready for my somewhat different take on street art.   When we ended, I packed up the pieces and thought about whether it could be done in a way that onlookers could also knead.   

Next came other students' mid term projects.    Shadow graffiti gave everyone, except Ron and me, a chance to throw themselves around.

I went home and baked bread.

Making bread in public...will you join me?

Oh, I am way behind in writing about my new idea to repair the world (tikkun olam again). 

KNEADING TO KNOW brought together ideas from two classes this past term at PSU, "World Population and Food Supply" and "Street Art class plus my recent dive into Sourdough bread baking.  Being in the class gave me the push I needed. I'd been wondering whether it was too late in this life for another one.

This effort would be much more modest than This Dirt Museum and Knit One Red Worm, more doable by non-crafters that Knit a Condom Amulet.  KNEADING TO KNOW is for all who eat bread, could be encouraged to make their own.

In early April, each of these professors received a plain brown paper bag with a slice of sourdough bread inside.  That was the first step.  Only slightly public (photo of my slipping the bag onto Hunter Shobe's lectern in "World Population" class). With excellent synchronicity, Rosemary, who gave me the sourdough starter, is speaking to him.

Beginning with  the "Bread not Bombs" image as the  organizing idea and image,  Kneading to Know joined my earlier declarations to become Manifesto #3: [Double-click on  images to enlarge]

 

What occurred next speaks to art as community...stay tuned.

 

 

 

 

Bread with Rosemary's starter, antdidote to war

"Celebrate the end, not the death, and be modest after victory.

                   --  Busha Full of Grace quotes son-in-law on bin Laden demise.

US military occupation forces in Iraq and Afganistan and attacking forces in Libya...  suffered 100 combat casualties in the week ending May 3, as the official casualty total rose to 104,320.  --weekly update from Michael Munk's newsletter

"...celebrating a killing as for a sports championship - a killing of choice in particular, even if it seems justified - leaves me a bit queasy."  Ronni Bennett, Time Goes By

Though not certain of the connection, my bread making obsession seems to have grown as my country of origin, the U.S.A., has moved further into endless war across the world.

Knowing that bread will not engage the masses the way the drama of   bang-bang and reporters captured by the alleged enemy, I am only more resolved.  Dough rises.

Since the beginning of the year, I've continued baking.

My neighbor, Rosemary, became aware of this when I distributed slices of my latest effort at a floor meeting in "The Tower" where we live.  The next I knew, we received cinnamon sweet rolls she'd made from sourdough starter.  She was surprised by my enthusiasm.

 

This winter's rye bread adventure with my friend Molly made me think I could do more though foolishly I'd not held a bit of that starter in the refrigerator.  Now Rosemary offered a cup of her very old sourdough. Over one hundred years old.  A neighbor in Idaho gave her a cup forty years back; neighbor's grandmother had brought it w ith  her across the Plains to the Oregon Territory.

 

Very heady connection for a little red hen, second generation American, to carry this historic stuff from her apartment to mine in an unassuming Trader Joe's yogurt container.   Several permutations later--French bread, figuring out that my 20-inch electric Amana stove had an inaccurate oven control--each loaf improves. 

 

Molly visited again last month.  We talked bread, books by breadmakers.  She brought along her favorite, Peter Reinhart's "Whole Grain Breads."  (Link to his TED talk to give you full flavor of philosophical, radical approach to wheat "...bread is solid beer.")  We exchanged about our respective college experiences--her return and my thoughts about my Street Art class midterm and bread connection.

  

Exciting to pass along to her, daughter of Moroccan father and American mother, a cup of Rosemary's old sourdough starter, changed by my use,  in a Greek yogurt container.  The bread drum grows louder for us peace conscious citizens who hope to save our country--one loaf at a time.

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Today, Rebecca Griffin at Peace Action West sends this request, please:

After Osama Bin Laden: even more reason to end the war

With Osama bin Laden's death, the supposed justifications for the war in Afghanistan continue to melt away.  President Obama will decide soon how many troops to withdraw starting in July. Take action now to tell your representative to cosponsor a new bipartisan bill calling for a plan to get out of Afghanistan.

Perfect gravy, new recipe, sourdough trial, and a terror scare: an American Thanksgiving in Portland

It was quite a holiday weekend.  The parts we could control were wonderful.  Along with our daughter's mother-in-law, Ron and I produced a delicious gravy.  Three of us working on it, someone said, "This needs a photo!"

The family that came to dinner arrived with a dish from her family and passed along the recipe.  Using a mix would be a departure for me but I really liked this one.  Might try without cheese.

Recipe for Scalloped Corn

1 can corn (drained of liquid)

1 can creamed corn

4 eggs, beaten

1/2 cup veg. oil

1 cup cheddar, grated

small package Jiffy cornbread mix

Mix all ingredients together in a bowl.

Pour into buttered casserole and bake 45 minutes 

at 350 degrees until light golden brown

Another year, another fresh turkey from Zupan's.  Our daughter is lucky to have this highend store in the neighborhood.  Some time I want to find out how they decided to open in Hawthorne when it was still mostly hippies.

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Saturday morning we opened the door to an Oregonian headline about a thwarted bomb attempt in crowded Pioneer Square the night before.  The plan had been to create havoc while thousands were attending the annual tree-lighting. 

Slightly rattled, we went on with our  plans to replicate a Rye Sourdough bread we'd done last June in a class at Bob's Red Mill.  I had not reported at that time that the baked loaves turned out to be undone on the bottom.

 In September we'd met Molly B. at the Montavilla Farmers' Market.  Thought we ought to explore other smaller markets in the city.  (Grandson Zach, now eight years, is reluctant to appear in photos these days unless making funny faces.)  I overheard Molly thanking one of the produce farmers by giving him an Elderberry pie she had made.  "I find them on bushes in the neighborhood,"  she told me.  Curious about elderberries new to me, our exchange led to talk of making bread together.

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I wanted to see if I could get a better result with last June's Sourdough Rye. Began a starter on Friday night.  Smelled yeasty, looked bubbly.   We worked away. It was a very moist dough--5 cups of water all told, including starter.  Molly demonstrated one-arm kneading; this would be good for me to develop my left, less-used side.  Molly suggested we try try cast iron   pans, a Cruset oval baker, and a black loaf pan.  What would be the result?

  All looked wonderful on completion but there were two problems.  I skipped the salt!  Also, the bottoms did not get totally done once again. Time to return to my old 1960s sourdoughs which required 3 or 4 days to develop, had more rye flavor, a dense texture. Gluten flour which produces lightness was in the current bread recipe and goes the wrong direction for my taste.  I like substantial bread! We'd had a delightful afternoon--even though our "product" was not what was  expected.  Molly went home with the big, traditionally-shaped loaf, we toasted ours, gave some to friends.

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Did I forget the salt because of the morning's headline?  Sadly, next day, Thanksgiving Sunday, the news opened with what we'd feared would occur next: someone set a fire in a Muslim mosque in Corvallis, Oregon, the city where we'd attended a peace vigil in September.  As one resident there noted, "People who go to Christian churches and do stupid things don't get their churches burned down."  Candlelight vigil tonight.

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[Comcast causing serious internet problems=difficult to control post paragraphs, Yahoo mail unstable.]

Roxie, the NYC girl, does Portland

It's her second trip here.  The last time Roxie and her parents (our son and daughter-in-law) were in Rose City their visit coincided with the birth of cousin Elianna.  Literally, the new baby arrived before her mom Rachel could get to the hospital.  Quite a scene.

Roxie's parents have made an effort to keep her memory of her now-moved grandparents up front, so she made a smooth transition to familiar old faces and furniture as soon as she arrived.

In her first week, she's been around the city-- painting in our apartment, eating in the Pearl Bakery (mounted police surprised us, provided a view out the windows).  Much playing with cousins.many thrilling rides on Portland's free trolley, another at a waterfront amusement park with Grandpa.

Today the cousins all go to the famous Rose Parade.  The SUN is shining, the sky is very blue after Roxie's introduction to the famous daily rains of the past week.

Thursday Ron and I had our own two-hour adventure--a hands-on breadmaking class, scheduled long before we knew when the New York group would arrive.  Held at Bob's Red Mill, [1500 grain-related recipes @ this link] a real mill, with an  excellent instructor, David Kobos, longtime coffee roaster.  David's avocation is baking bread, tweaking recipes he finds in out-of-print books.

   He also raises chickens --check out these gorgeous ones from his flock of 50.  A very popular class, we'd signed up early, thought it was a good way to celebrate Ron's  75th birthday.  Watching David is another old guy in the class...a trend? 

Talking afterwards we discovered  that David, besides all else, shares a background with us in teaching in 1960s public schools in New York City.  The time went by very quickly; all the chairs were filled but my picture was taken during a seven-minute break!  We had an enjoyable, energetic time, and learned new approaches to making bread.  We're going to try his Sourdough Rye recipe at home.

Good to be with someone around our age sharing his enthusiasms.  The student across the way from me had this one tatoo (she told me so) and agreed to have its picture taken.  Now that I have spiky haircut, could a tiny tatoo be in my future....I might move more toward "Portlandness" with, like her,  just one.

It's very special  to have all our family in the same place. We're grateful to Nick and Leanne for making the trip and taking three weeks out of busy NYC lives.  Last night Rachel put together Ron's strawberry historical (another story) shortcake idea, everyone sang Happy Birthday in an informal, kitchen celebration of his 75th. Tomorrow is Zach's 8th birthday.  We're  very lucky old people!