sourdough: one rise or two?

With a new sourdough, you can't assume it will be strong enough for two rises and still have some oven spring left. Some do and some don't, and is it worth the trouble? I like to compare one rise to two, which is what you see below.

This is one batch of dough. It had sponge of about 8 hrs.+, and then mixed to include about a tablespoon of oil and a teaspoon of ground flax seed. The first rise was in the 'fridge overnight and then at room temperature until doubled (about 3 hrs. on the kitchen counter). At that point, one loaf was docked and baked, the rectangular loaf.


The other half of the dough was punched down and shaped into an oval, and had a second rise on the counter, at 73F. After almost doubling, it was then docked and baked. Both loaves were baked for 35 minutes in a 400F oven without steam.



The flavor is only slightly more sour in the oval loaf. The size of the holes in the crumb is the same. The big difference is in the crust. After a single rise, the crust is pale and soft, like most Americans (and my kids) like bread. After two rises, it's darker and crunchy, in a more European style crust.

In this one experiment, I learned 3 useful things: 1) this sourdough is strong enough for a sponge and two rises, 2) a second rise = more crunch, and 3) if I want to make it dramatically more sour or get big bubbles, I'm going to have to work hard at it. And for #3, I probably won't bother because my kids hate real sour with holes the jelly can fall through, and I'm okay with that. It tastes great, and I'll probably only do a second rise if that's more convenient to the schedule of the rest of my life.

Sourdough: sleeper awakes

fungi

sunny woods

tired butterfly

Jimsom Weed

pleated fairy mushrooms

Iowa grapes

New Sourdough

Despite having a less than ideal summer, in early August something wonderful happened: I captured a new wild sourdough. The combination of wild yeast and symbiont bacteria is unique to a place, so the sourdough from my backyard is quite literally the taste of home.

In the photo is the first loaf of bread from the new sourdough, sliced up and about to be part of a backyard picnic. Not shown: my kids circling like sharks.

The River, floodstage

For a lot of people in Siouxland, this was The Summer That Did Not Go As Planned. The Missouri River flooded and many people in S. Dakota, Nebraska, and Iowa had to evacuate their houses on less than a week's notice at the end of May. Before the flood, there was a very wet spring, and the high waters in July and August were accompanied by drought. Hard times for many people, from ranchers to casino workers. People are now returning to their homes, only to find them unlivable.

Our house didn't flood, but it didn't sell, either. My camera had a mechanical failure and hasn't been fixed yet, because the washer, dryer, bathroom vent wiring, and 'fridge have all needed professional help. So I've borrowed the camera of my oldest child to resume blogging--please bear with me as the blog comes back.

The photo shows the Missouri about 3 feet above flood stage, in NW Iowa. The water's normally on the far side of the trees. It's lower water than was predicted, but it's estimated the fast-moving water scoured about 8 feet off the river bed, silt that was dumped downstream.

spring?!

This morning.

sprouts 3

sprouts 4

sprouts 2

sprouts 1

Selling & illusion

After several years in one house, we're trying to sell it and move into another.

We've done all the things we're supposed to do: dutifully watched the makeovers of much more expensive houses online, courtesy HGTV; gotten realtors' advice and mostly taken it; painted and arranged and emptied. Compressing my kitchen is pushing the boundaries of physics, because either it's bigger on the inside than on the outside or black holes are NOT formed by too great a density of matter causing a collapse.

So the kids' stuff is all supposed to be tidy as only an adult can make it, and adults are supposed to have small wardrobes, few books, and no hobbies. Except yardwork is supposed to be our hobby--our yard is supposed to look perfect at all times, perfect as only petrochemical toxins can make it. I've always had a private peace with the Dandelion Nation, but we're supposed to be at war.

The kitchen ought to look like no one cooks in it, and the only permitted smells are cookies, cinnamon rolls, or bread. It was recommended that I keep individual blobs of cookie dough and cinnamon roll dough in the freezer, to pop one in the oven just before a scheduled showing. The smells of bacon or frying garlic are specifically to be avoided. Riiiiiiiiiight.

Oh, and my house is to be show ready in an hour at all times: dry and polished sinks, spotless bathroom, clean floors and vacuumed carpet, authorized smells only!

That's not even the start of most house staging advice, where the unwritten rule seems to be: sell your children on ebay to buy small modern furniture.

The express purpose of all this is to make a subjective appeal to the buyer's fantasies. It's supposed to be clutter-free to create the illusion of space. It's supposed to be free of photos, religious images of any kind, and any flamboyant decor so the buyers can imagines it as their house, not mine. It's supposed to be calm, neutral, and warm to allow the buyer to imagine themselves living there stress-free. The perfect yard work is supposed to show how meticulously the house has been cared for. And the smell of baking in the kitchen....

...no one is willing to say.

Don't get me wrong. I kinda like my house with more than half my stuff taken out of it and resting comfortably in storage. There is something to be said for light fixtures younger than I. Thinking about my house in terms of obvious purpose, clear traffic flow, and enhancing the best feature of each room I don't mind.

But gosh, does anyone but me think this is SO 1952? As in, Father comes home from work and does lots of lawn care every evening, and Mother devotes every moment to care of the house and making cookies. Or the help does it. Children are few, tidy, and invisible.

I don't know quite what the alternatives are. But it's weird. Good thing I'm too busy polishing sinks to get to the bottom of all this fantasy.

camoflage

Still Here

Hi! So, yes, I fell off the earth a while. Sorry about that.

I'd like to regale you with tales of my adventures, but then my real life already has too many I-couldn't-make-it-up-if-I-tried elements for me to start making things up.

The unglamourous fact is that I got really sick the day after my last post & then got a job. And not the kind of job that will impress people, either. No, my new job is to get my house ready to show/sell and it has eclipsed the rest of my interests. My camera is languishing. I haven't written a thing, and Not Making a Huge Mess has become a cooking goal.

There are women who blog this sort of thing, but I don't expect to. For one thing, prepping a house to sell means making it conventional, and why would you want to see that? And I don't want to photograph the process, because my primary job hasn't gone away: I already have to worry about not getting paint on my toddler & trying to do 2 things at once will not be improved by adding a third.

Am I learning new things? Yes.
Do I have tangible results? Yes.
Does it give me stress? Yes.
Is it empowering? I'd rather feel empowered by spending time with my rifle.

Still, painting gives me time to think & I often find myself doing story analysis while I paint. I hope that will later pay off.

Baby Bok Choy

point & shoot pretties

Bowl o'Red

Texas chili is not an arcane art. I'm always amazed to hear of the elaborate secretive hijinx of competitive chili teams. Yes, it is a team sport in Texas. If you ever see it, Chile Pepper Magazine is an entertaining read even if you only read the ads. Good photography, too.

Your average Texan isn't looking for the ultimate cook-off chili. What a Texan wants is a bowl o' red. It's meaty, it's smooth, and it is completely, utterly, free of beans. It doesn't take 10 hours to make or a special cut of meat. If you use hamburger, the clattering, wan ghosts of chuck wagons past will not circle your bed in the night.

Texas Chili:
1 1/2 lbs. Hamburger
1 fat clove Garlic, minced
1 teaspoon ground Cumin
1 teaspoon Chili powder
1 teaspoon Chipotle powder
1/2 teaspoon Oregano
1 teaspoon Bacon grease ( no substitutes!)
1/3 can tomato paste
water & salt
cornmeal or masa to thicken

1. In a big skillet, brown the hamburger and leave it lumpy. Drain the grease if you want to.
2. In a pot, gently fry the garlic in the bacon grease till it's soft. Add about a cup of water to stop it frying if you need to. Then stir in the tomato paste till it's smooth.
3. Add all the meat and all the spices (not the thickener). Add water to cover, and stir well.
4. Simmer gently for about 20 min. and add the salt. How much salt? More if it will go over rice, Cajun style, and less if it will go over corn chips. If you use canned tomato sauce or diced tomatoes, you'll need a lot less than if you use paste, with is unsalted (and cheaper).

At this point, it's perfectly okay to eat. But it will taste better if you turn off the heat and let it rest a few hours.

About 10 min. before serving, mix up your thickener to avoid lumps and stir it in to simmer about 10 minutes. I use ordinary yellow cornmeal; if you have masa it tastes fine. I've seen a recipe suggest using a big spoonful of Jiffy brand cornbread mix, which makes sense if you're making it, but it's very sweet by Texas standards.

Serve it plain or over corn chips. If you're just dying for that Friday night football stadium taste, squirt processed cheese over it all. (I never touch the stuff.)

And no beans. Anathema sit!
*******
Austinites of a certain age will remember Hill's, a steakhouse owned by the Goodnight ranching family, serving their beef. What amazing chili they had! (And sourdough dinner rolls I never equalled at the height of my bread-god powers.) The Goodnight ranch tried a cross breeding experiment decades ago between cows and buffalo (American bison). The experiment failed, but if you substitute ground buffalo for some of the beef, the chili will taste absolutely fabulous. Hill's was a casualty of the recession of '86-'87, but reopened in 2001; I haven't been there.

Thai Chicken Coconut Soup: Ka Tom Gai

There are loads of recipes out there for this soup: it's cheap, it's easy, and a beginner cook can get restaurant results on the first try. And it doesn't have to be spicy hot if you don't want it to be--it tastes perfectly fine without any chile at all. It's a myth that all Thai food is hot.

After shoveling way too much sidewalk and driveway in -1F, I had this and then a second bowl.

A Soft Crust Surprise

Okay, this bread began as breakfast gone awry. But it turned out really well, and it achieved something difficult: a soft crust without adding any fat, egg, or other sneaky trick. It's not the right recipe if you're a complete beginner, but you don't need to be a gluten goddess, either.

There is one sneaky trick, with the salt, but I'll explain at the end.

The Gruel:
3/4 c. rolled oats (the 5 min. cook kind)
3 c. water

Boil the oats in the water till it's thickened, the oats are hardly distinct, and the volume somewhat reduced. When you think of Charles Dickens, you're there. Take it off the heat to cool to a yeast-friendly temperature.

The Poolish:
1/2 t. dry yeast (I like Red Star)
1 c. flour

Pour the warm gruel into your bread bowl. Scrape any papery film on the sides of the pot in, too; that's soluble fibre and will dissolve again easily. Add about half a teaspoon of dry yeast (NOT quick rise yeast, which is evil) and about a cup of flour. Mix together well, cover, and let it ferment all day and overnight.

In the morning, you will have an unlovely bowl of stinky, bubbly, swamp juice.

The Dough:
Flour
Salt

Add flour till it starts to come together well. Then add salt to the desired taste, and finish it to a soft, but not sticky, dough. (The sneaky salt trick is below.)

Yes, I ought to have quantities, but I hardly ever use them myself. The salt was about half a tablespoon, which is a bit more than I'd use for a French dough. A bland addition, like oatmeal, and sourness from a long poolish both need a bit more salt.

Oil your bread bowl, drop the dough in and then flip it to coat with oil. Cover and let double in bulk. In my winter kitchen (temp. mid-50s) that took about 3 hrs.--it's like having a fancy bread retarder for free several months of the year! The top picture is the doubled dough in an ordinary bread bowl.

Gently turn it out of the bowl and press out all the air bubbles. Divide it in half & shape each half into a boule; set on the baking pan. I use cornmeal on mine, but whatever you ordinarily use. Cover it, because it will dry easily.

Ideally, they would then double and be docked. But I didn't do that. After an hour, I docked them and put them in the 400F oven 'cause another couple of hours' rise was not in my schedule. I baked them for 40 minutes, which is about the minimum for that size. That's an electric oven, no steam.

The Surprise
The crust was soft when it came out of the oven. The crust was still soft after it cooled. The crust was still soft the next day! No oil, no egg, just a soft crust with pure grain taste.

The crumb was even throughout: no big bubbles saying,"Look at me! I'm so artisan!"

My kids think this is the perfect bread. It doesn't have any little oatmeal lumps in the crumb or crust, which happens if you make it with normal cooked oatmeal. It has a soft, dense crumb with the short second rise. The kids hate those big holes the jam falls through. And the crust is good for the weird little aliens who don't want a nice European crunchy crust. It's pretty much perfect with honey.

The Salt Trick
How to get the salt right when you're working without a recipe: know the taste of the dough. When I used to bake all the time, the bread I made most was a French poolish and we had tweaked the recipe till it was consistently just what we wanted. First step was to pour the measured salt into my palm, so I'd get an idea what a certain amount looked like in my hand. That way, I learned to get the right amount of salt for that recipe by eye. And I tasted the raw dough. That way I knew what the right amount of salt tasted like. Day after day, I measured by eye in my hand and tasted the dough.

Making bread at home, I'm usually working with approximately the same amount of dough, so I know roughly how much salt I need to begin with. But working without a recipe, like here, I always begin with a little less than I'll think I need. When it's well mixed but not yet kneaded, I pop a raisin-sized piece in my mouth. If it tastes right, I knead just a minute or two (kneading is vastly overrated if your flour's good quality). If the salt is lacking, I add a bit of salt as I start to knead and then check again.

Only you know what the right taste is for you. I prefer less salt than many recipes call for, but I'll try to describe it. When I put the bit of dough in my mouth, I should taste a little bit of salt immediately. After a few seconds, I should taste more salt as it dissolves. If I don't taste it till it's had time to dissolve, it's not enough. If it's so salty I notice it over the flour or it's sharp, that's too much salt and it needs more flour.

Once you've mastered the salt trick, you can experiment easily. If a dough has a sweetener, you might need a tiny bit more salt. If the dough has something more bland than wheat flour, like oatmeal or potato, it will need more salt. Fresh herbs and sun dried tomatoes need only a tiny bit extra. It'll give you a lot of confidence to play.

Thai Eggplant

So what's so special about Thai eggplant? It's very mild, the skin is tender, and the seeds are soft. Cut off the tops, quarter them, and you're ready to go. They are about the size of golf balls. And they look really cool.

Farmer Boy, Tiger Mothers, and me

Of all the Laura Ingalls Wilder books, Farmer Boy was my favorite as a kid. I know now that much of the appeal of Farmer Boy was how closely it mirrored my own Montessori education in important ways.

I can't briefly sketch the whole philosophy! But for our purposes: Montessori education intentionally honors a child's natural curiosity, initiative, and desire for competence. Students are responsible for their own learning, and allowed to pursue their own interests and manage their time, at a very early age. It's important for a child to develop the ability to evaluate their own work. Montessori directors (teachers) won't praise a child, because it's considered demeaning to the child if they come to work for others' praise; or in more recent pop psychobabble, their natural internal rewards must not be replaced by social or external rewards. More controversially, students are seldom required to do a project individually or in group work; it's a choice they negotiate with other students. The goal is to become competent in their own environment, by exploration, instruction, and real responsibilities.

So Farmer Boy appealed to me very much: Almanzo's a child with real responsibilities, becoming competent in his environment, well on his way to acquiring the skills he needs as an adult. His interest in horses is respected by his father. Almanzo is learning the skills and the virtues when he's 8 yrs. old that will make him an independent adult. Very Montessori.

Which brings me to the current controversy surrounding "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother." No, I haven't read it, but it's hard to avoid the interviews, summaries, and the backlash online. And I've known several people who were raised that way, Eastern European and Japanese. Several were young professional musicians having international careers; one was a roommate we had a suicide watch for because she was failing a class. This doesn't make me an expert by any means, but I've seen extreme positive and negative results of Tiger Mothering up close and personal.

And I admire one thing about Tiger Mothering: at least the things the child makes steep sacrifices for are things of lasting value. Diligent study habits have long term positive benefits. Playing piano or violin well is a lifetime skill--and the grown child can make that as social or private, festive or meditative, as they choose. It might not justify the rigor of this form of child rearing -that's certainly debatable- but I admire that the goals are not trivial nor transient. The musicians I've known who were forced to practice for hours from the time they were 3 (and sometimes beaten for failure) have international careers, are extraordinary musicians, and did not resent or regret the cost of their proficiency.

What upsets me a lot more is the pseudo-Chinese Mothers. They are the mothers who are shocked and puzzled that I didn't automatically put my 4 yr. old in soccer. Then when I tell them he wasn't interested, they are shocked and puzzled I didn't sign him up anyway. I've had mothers tell me point blank I am wrong not to force him into soccer (and sometimes other sports as well), and that respecting his wishes is no way to raise him. And to be clear, this is soccer 10+ hrs. a week for 4 yr. olds; they're "behind" and need remedial tutoring if they start at age 6. To me, this is worse than "Battle Hymn", because these kids make most of the same sacrifices but gain something trivial. They work harder than Almanzo did at harvest, and gain no skills that make them adults or competent in any meaningful way.

When women have told me I'm crazy not to force my kids into the sports mania and it's inevitable (yes, women have told me this to my face), I don't whack them with Montessori's theory. I tell them, as politely and gently as I can, that leadership and service are central to my family, and to develop my son's initiative and judgement I have to honor them first. That's usually the end of the conversation.

Doughnut Muffins

Recipe from Jenna here, thanks to Ree at The Pioneer Woman. The kids love'em!

Montessori & tech

Dr. Maria Montessori's writings were the basis of my education till I was twelve and a half. Montessori isn't the right approach for every kid, but it was certainly the right one for me.

And it's the right approach for my son. One of the guiding principles of Montessori is competence in one's own environment. For example, Dr. Montessori introduced children's furniture, believe it or not--it was a huge innovation to have desks and chairs for small bodies a hundred years ago. Similarly, small pitchers and toaster ovens for food prep are standard as a temporary aid. But the goal is always an adult level of competence, not cuteness. Age 4-5 is the right time to start kids cooking, and we have.

But my kitchen is a lot different than that of late 19th cent. Italy. For one thing, there's this woman with a camera in it. And my boy, naturally enough, wants to take pictures, wants his own blog (he's been online since he was 4), and just read my book on food styling. And his 5 yr. old sister is reading and learning to cook now.

So our latest project is that while I'm cooking with my daughter, my son gets to learn some food photography. He holds the camera over carpet in the dining room ('cause my kitchen's too small for 2 people, much less 3), I get pictures of stuff that takes both my hands, and my daughter doesn't have to share the whisk with him. Of course, that means I'm teaching 2 completely different things at the same time, but so far, my head hasn't exploded. I'm also starting slow, only having him shoot one or two steps.

This isn't homeschooling, btw. I fully support the homeschooling movement, but my kids are in an alternative school (Montessori's not available). Their school is based on a theory of the human person very similar to Montessori's, so they don't get theoretical whiplash. I'm not sure how a Montessori purist would react to this use of technology, frankly--electric toys are a big no-no. But it is competence in his environment. That's his photo on top, SOOC.

Asian grocery: white fungus & incense

Asian grocery: bamboo shoots

Asian grocery: peppers & eggs

Asian grocery: lemongrass

a foodstyling resource

So two weeks ago, the New Books section of the library had Food Styling: The Art of Preparing Food for the Camera by Delores Custer, 2010. I grabbed it, and I recommend it.

I notice good photography on the food blogs I read, and my blogroll reflects this. But I've shied from food styling. It's pretentious in person-- I hate desserts that have architectural elements. Fancy plating doesn't impress me at all. But shouldn't a picture of food look good?

I recently googled the wonderful, not-pretentious bakery that did our wedding cake. I'm a fan for life. They do beautiful French pastry and beautiful cakes, and their website is just terrible! By terrible I mean that my December shot of finished baklava was better than any picture on their site. It's a thousand+ miles away and I'd gladly shoot their whole bakery free just for the joy of it. Well made food deserves to be well represented.

And when I made Tom's Chicken Under a Brick, the kitchen shots were, um, barely tolerable. But when I did the whole menu with the leftovers, I felt bad that the chicken didn't look good. Not only did it not look delicious, but it looked greasy even though it wasn't. So I flipped through the book to the right chapter and tried again. It's not professional quality, but still a zillion times better.(see below)

The book is well worth reading even if you don't want to take nice food pictures--my 7 year old thinks it's cool to know all the sneaky tricks used to get some of the pictures you see. But nice food pictures are the whole point of Custer's Food Styling. She taught food styling for decades, and her teaching experience really shows. It's very well organized, clear, and mostly jargon-free (glossary in the back, too).

The immediate target readers are aspiring professional food stylists. It's very practical--what tools to have with you, what skills can diversify your income, etc. She doesn't cover photography, color, or formal elements of composition. But just about everything else you can imagine IS covered. The effects of different lighting and different props are excellent. Contrasting photos illustrate her points very well throughout the book. And there are great sections for "challenges"--meaning stuff that's hard to shoot. Everything is about getting it right at the time of the shoot, not fixing it later in a digital editing program. There's also a good bit of business advice.

The part most valuable to me so far has been all her practical tips for emphasizing certain ingredients or characteristics. For a blatant example:

Hot off the pan--looks greasy!

Slightly warm, from the same batch of chicken.

A nicer example of what I've learned is this:

This shot doesn't stress one element of the soup, and the olive oil on top is nicely visible. The lighting needs work, and a bit of cropping. But this is basically the sort of shot you'd see at the beginning of a recipe.


This shot stresses the artichoke hearts' unique texture and minimizes the olive oil. The strong symmetry of the vegetables and the bowl are at odds with the lemons & stripes at the top. In both shots, a piece of artichoke heart has wandered and some thyme has scooted up the bowl; for a more professional look, both of those would have to be fixed.


A very casual reading of the book has improved my photos a lot (given my limitations in lighting and equipment, I need all the help I can get). I've also learned how they could be further improved toward a professional standard. I don't aspire to a career in food styling or food photography. But if I were an ambitious food blogger or aspiring to do my own cookbook, this book would be extremely valuable for getting the quality of photo AND the right type of styling for the target audience.

The author, who has never heard of me, has her own professional web site here.