her able hands

If you’ve always wanted to try making your own bread, but worry it will come out like a brick or a hockey puck—this is your bread. If you don’t have the time and/or energy it takes to make beautiful artisan loaves like you can buy at the local bakery (some of those recipes take 3-4 days), but really wish you did because it chaps your hide to pay $6 for something you know you ought to be able to make in your own damn kitchen—this is your bread.

I used to bake artisan breads every week when I was home with the kids, but have only attempted it twice since I went back to work. I’ve missed having that in my life but there are only so many available hours away from the cubicle, and as you can probably see, I’ve been a bit cupcake obsessed lately. Both times I committed to the 3-day process and made the incredible Rosemary Olive Oil breads from my Amy’s Bread cookbook, the loaves came out stunning and I thoroughly enjoyed the process from the first mixing of the sponge, to tipping the loaves to knock on the bottom to see if they were ready. It made me feel connected to my food in that special way that I believed only a long, slow process can do. Well, that’s what I used to think.

Now I know that the long, slow process can happen with fewer steps—with steps so few as a matter of fact, that anyone and everyone should be able to find time to put a fresh loaf on the table once a week—and still turn out a most amazing loaf of bread with a chewy, flaky crust and large air bubbles and a beautiful crumb.

Now, I used a mix of whole wheat and unbleached white organic flours and let it sit on the counter for 22 hours, but my kitchen was cold. I never have it up to 70º unless I’m already in there cooking, so I don’t think it ever got quite warm enough. The 2-hour rise in the floured towels did not produce a tall puff so much as a wide, low one, but the dough had very good spring, so I gave it an extra half-hour while the dutch oven warmed, then dumped it in and hoped for the best. The fragrance of freshly baked bread may even top my love for the smell of melted chocolate. The finished loaf, as you can see, came out a little flat, but it did puff up in the oven some, and really, it didn’t seem to effect the flavor at all. It had a slightly sour aftertaste, and the crust was rich and chewy with bits of cornmeal baked into it, the air pockets were shiny from the stretched gluten and they made the perfect little spoons for sopping up extra sauce.

We tucked into that loaf with the ragú (which blew my mind, again with the slow process cooking, so very, very good) and a green salad with honey mustard dressing for our Sunday dinner, and it was heavenly. Chris’ mom joined us and we sat at the dining room table (which hasn’t happened in a while because we’ve been piling things in there while we work on other areas of the house) and it made me so happy to have everyone facing each other. To have conversation. To see my family’s faces while they ate, the happy little noises everyone made as they tasted each thing (though Lila emphatically did not like the salad dressing because it was too spicy).

So seriously, try this bread. It’s well worth the effort, and as Sandra said in the comments on Saturday’s post, making it made her feel like a real baker. And if you’re interested in a most excellent online source for all things bread, do go and check out The Fresh Loaf.

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Yesterday was all about the sweetness. I spent the day in the kitchen while Chris worked on boxes of stuff in the basement, sorting and filing and throwing away. Lila floated between the two of us, helping me mix cupcakes, then running upstairs with photos and other finds to share. “Freemember this? When I was in your belly still? Look at how big your tummy is mama!” She wanted to keep that photo of my bare belly right up on the fridge. Uh, no.

Tyler spent the day reading and doing homework and never once asked to get on the computer or to play video games, which was kind of weird, but also very nice to not have that extra vibration going on in the background. Later he went to a friends’ house to play D & D for a few hours (cracks me up kids still play that…I spent so many hours hanging out with the group of kids I was friends with in high school utterly mystified by the whole thing while they gathered hit points and slayed dragons and bludgeoned one another as they tried to fulfill their make-believe quests). I guess I’ve always lacked imagination in that way.

Chris at one point stood in the kitchen while I sifted chocolate, flour, ancho chili powder, cayenne, baking powder and baking soda together. We were talking about getting the light stand finished by next weekend so we can start planting and the sun streamed in the kitchen window and Lila had her arms wrapped around his legs and he said “I really hope this stage of my life lasts a really long time. It’s so good. Everything is so good.”

And I got all teary because he isn’t usually very demonstrative in that way. But I didn’t let any tears drop into the Mexican Hot Chocolate Cupcakes because even though they were tears of happy sweetness (just one or two, really), I don’t want to be working that kind of magic on my office mates, and that’s who the bulk of the cakes are destined for this afternoon. Drumming up business, don’t you know?

I have to tell you, these cupcakes rock the house.

Even Dora thinks so!

The cake came out super moist and the flavor is just so incredible, a sweet, mild chili and rich chocolate with an ever-so-slight, slow after burn. Lila helped me spread the layer of thick ganache, which is spiced lightly with organic cinnamon and then we piped a fat star of very vanilla buttercream (Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla) and topped that with a red hot. Goodness, I wish I could send you one, and you too!

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Busyness all weekend (nothing seed or garden related, but I’m out of the self-flagellation business, so we’ll just vett that to next weekend’s to-do list).

Chris surprised me Saturday afternoon by coming home with four new seats for the dining room chairs cut out of 3/8″ plywood. We all got busy taking the nasty covers off.

I was so happy to see that material in the trash. And check out the ugly vinyl underneath. I wonder whose rear ends made it so shiny.

Chris had to use his special pliers to remove the ancient, rusted tacks holding that vinyl in place. Those are working man’s hands, right there.

Lila helped, too. She was in charge of soaping the screws before Chris put them through the seat into the frame. Cheap made in China screws kept snapping off and after the fourth one he decided to put a drop of dish liquid in the hole and on the threads. Problem solved.

I didn’t get any photos of the actual reupholstering process because after an hour of the two of us struggling with one, I got frustrated and decided to go into the kitchen where I don’t have to deal with unfamiliar spatial relationships. I just couldn’t figure out how to fold the fabric without making it all lumpy and backwards and uneven and Chris could see it just fine. Bless him and his eternal patience with me, he just listened as I complained and questioned and pulled out staples and refolded and complained and re-stapled and pulled them out again and threw up my hands and ran upstairs to change because I was sweating so much.

We had dinner plans with Cheril & Greg yesterday and we were in charge of salad and dessert. I made these fantastic dark chocolate cupcakes by Chockylit but without the truffle aspect and I did a ganache glaze and a spritz of vanilla buttercream frosting and shaved dark chocolate curls on top. So basically, I used her cupcake recipe, which was absolutely incredible. So chocolatey and moist. I also added a half teaspoon of pure orange extract and a tablespoon of orange zest to the melted chocolate for the cake. And when I made my ganache, I added three tablespoons of butter to give it that nice shiny glaze.

I read on Chockylit’s site that my overflowing cake cups might have something to do with my oven temp being too low. She recommends preheating the oven to 25º warmer than the baking calls for, then turning it down as soon as you put the cupcakes in. I was very careful to only fill the cups 3/4 full and then tried that with the temperature, and they came out perfect. Psyche!

And look at how pretty they are! I so enjoyed presenting them last night and everyone made happy, yummy dessert sounds as they ate. So good.

So it was a multi-person, multi-tasking kind of day around here yesterday.

While I was busy in the kitchen putting together little love cakes, Chris was busy in the living room making our chairs pretty.

He says he wants to redo the second one from the left, but overall we’re both very happy with the way they came out. We used a thicker piece of foam than one might normally use, but I like the lift. Can’t wait to get that dining room wallpaper stripped off and the room painted next.

Speaking of paint, here’s a shot (crooked, sorry) of the corner where the green meets the red-orange. I’m so happy with this room.

Now we just need some more artwork for the walls. But doesn’t Cathy’s little painting look spectacular against the green?

Happy sigh.

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I finally moved about 2000 digital photos out of my iPhoto and onto a couple of CDs last night. I edited out the many, many duplicate shots of food and plants and in the process took a wonderful trip down the memory lane of this past growing season. Such a treat remembering the many ways our hands stayed busy all summer long and to see proof again when right now when it’s 17 degrees out and the world is encrusted in ice and snow, and it feels as if nothing will ever grow again. It’s SO good to review all we have put in place so far to become less dependent upon the grinding commercial food industry and to gain inspiration for growing that independence even more in the coming season.

I picked this first hand full of Vermont Cranberry beans too early because I grew impatient with the lack of sun on the pods and the weeks they took to even begin to blush.

I had a big helper in the garden all season and I thrilled to see Lila grow more conscious of what her hands should and should not do while moving in and out of the plants. She was my number one cherry tomato harvester.

Between my garden and the farmers’ market, I set out a giant bowl of fresh salad at just about every dinner we ate last summer. Next summer I’d like to learn some more homemade dressing recipes, I relied a little too heavily on Newman’s Own vinaigrettes which is fine but a little boring. If you have a favorite salad dressing recipe, please share!

Pinch me again! I almost forgot that these black raspberries grow wild right behind the gardens next door, and if we get some early summer rains, they’re plump and juicy just like the ones in this bowl. Mercy, they were so good. I can’t even find words to describe the wild berry explosion that occurred after I popped each one in my mouth. Heaven?

I won’t need to buy any seed potato in the spring because the harvest sprouted in the basement much faster than I thought it would. I guess it’s a little too warm down there, and I’d like to look at eventually turning one corner into a true root cellar by blocking it in with cement blocks.

In about six weeks I’m going to replant the greens boxes and then try not to stare out the window at them to make time move more quickly and bring us back around to that lush, glorious green of high summer. I’m still working on my seed list and narrowing down what to buy. I’ll be planting in the oversize cold frame that Chris built as well — the one with the much too high back and the big bay window that’s too heavy to lift and has a frame so flimsy that it feels as if it will shatter in mid-air. But it’s salad greens real estate and maybe I’ll figure out a way to modify it so it’s less deadly.

Looking back is such an inspiring way to examine the here and now in order to set forth the plan for the future, don’t you think?

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It’s a good thing I started off my weekend with a list but no expectations. What I meant to be a cleaning and seed sorting/winter sowing extravaganza turned into a freelance catch-up, business website development and living room painting marathon.

The photos I took of the living room came out terrible, so I won’t bother you with any until it’s all finished and everything is put back where it belongs. But we got bold and chose a gorgeous, rich red-orange called carnelian for the wall that goes up the stairs. We hate the light green we picked for the rest of the room and now have two gallons we don’t know what to do with. It’s just a bit too minty, though it didn’t look that way in the store at all. Darned fluorescent lights. We’re thinking we might need a very light, creamy coffee to pull it all together.

Of course, I should tell you that when I say “we” I mean Chris. He does all of the painting and he does it freehand without taping any edges, and never makes a mess. The lines along the ceiling? Flawless. And! And he did it with Lila helping him paint. Maudess bless that man, he’s way more patient than I’ll ever be—just the thought of trying to pay attention to a little girl who leaps and twirls with every movement, paint brush be damned…well. You get the picture.

So back to the paint store for some new color study. Next month we’ll do the dining room and kitchen and already have those colors picked out. Chris and Tyler moved the piano into the dining room last night, which opened up the corner at the bottom of the stairs and we’re thinking of getting a chaise lounge of some sort with a little table and a lamp. It’s so nice to have that window visible again. The dining room’s a bit crowded feeling, but that’s partly because stuff is stacked all over the table. We can make it work, I think. There really isn’t anywhere else to put the piano unless right back by the window in the living room. And one of these days I’m going to get it repaired and start lessons for myself and Lila. Unfortunately, having it in the dining room means I won’t be able to get that groovy sideboard after all.

It’s so good to be finally figuring out how we want to occupy the spaces in this house by finally putting our own style in it and making it our own.

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