Buds and baguettes

Out walking this morning while the baguette dough was rising, sounds like a traditional English song, early one morning, just as the bread was riiising,  where was I, and noticed that first reddish tinge of budding leaves on the treetops.

At home it's looking as if the honesty finally showed up and has self seeded outside the pot.

And the vinca that came from next door is flowering 

I'm not a fan of vinca because it vines around and makes it easy to trip, but the flowers are nice 

I'd been walking while the baguette dough, this time with bread flour, was rising. Home again to knock it down and fold it a bit and form the baguettes, then leave them for another rise.

Hot from the oven smelling fine and a nice crumb. Lunch, forgot the picture, too hungry, was a chunk of hot baguette, split and stuffed with sharp cheddar which melted, and a green salad. Dessert yogurt and peach chunks. 

The bread flour was excellent but I think next time I'll use a bit of whole wheat too, whole grain always good.   I also think I'll double the recipe and freeze the extra.

I've been following a daily Lenten meditation series written by the nun who receives my knitting with flattering thanks. 

The messages are quite revealing about herself, along with New testament references. It doesn't quite compare with the Mirror book of mystical thoughts,  but it's a nice community of thought. 

I don't think of prayer as words, and certainly not the endless nagging I detect when people are forever petitioning for something.  I grew up more in a laborare est orare kind of mindset. Working is prayer. It's playing the hand you're dealt, not fussing for a better one with more high cards in it. And it's not about religion. For me.

Anyway that's me today. Happy day everyone, send good wishes and vibes to blogger e for a successful surgery and good recovery.

 

Resting, knitting, baking

Pouring rain all day, so, indoors,  I got on with knitting and next time I'm out, I can send off a package to the sock n glove n whistle Ministry.

And I was completely out of bread, so I decided I had enough energy to make a couple of wholewheat baguettes. Because the humidity was very high today, they were a bit flatter than usual but the crumb is very nice and the crust is good. 

I'm finding baguettes toast very nicely, to go with practically anything. 

With roast carrots and mushrooms for supper, for instance. Maybe a fried egg on top. 

Nice quiet day, no irruptions, maybe I'll bake a cake tomorrow. Chocolate or banana, we'll see. But I think I'll give the knitters a miss, not up to that yet and I need to conserve energy for Wednesday's bone density injection. 

It's all good. Happy day everyone, bake bread. Or don't, it's fine. Oh, the powdered milk which had vanished from my account after vague promises of delivery by April 25, has suddenly shown up, now to arrive Wednesday. 

That's March 25. I think the snow got it drifted in somewhere, since it comes from Wisconsin. Maybe by way of Idaho, who knows. 

I'm hip, busy with baguettes, and winnowing

Hip update: three sessions of Will's exercises and the hip has subsided, much better, clearly the right approach. It's not all gone but the sharp and sharper jab at each turn is down to a pinch. I'll take it. I also did other exercises, toe raises, sit to stands, sideways stepping, all that.

I don't like pie much, even on Pi Day, so baguettes it was. This time I used one third whole-wheat with the ap, and added in vital wheat gluten to compensate. I had to add extra water to get the dough to cohere. It went fine.

Here's a bit broken off to show you the crumb. There's more flavor with the whole wheat, the added gluten made a better rise, and again the crust was great.

I'd taken out a container of strawberries earlier from the freezer with the vague thought of strawberry shake, but realized a bit of strawberry jam wouldn't go amiss with warm baguette. 

Strawberry preserve, to be technically annoying, because there are fruit pieces in there.

Then with hauling out the overstuffed  three ring binder for the baguette instructions,  I realized for the 83rd time that I needed to organize it.

A lot of the entries were either aspirational or more trouble than they were worth, or I just don't fancy them.

So after an afternoon of knitting, reading and sorting, strengthened by toasted  buttered, strawberry-preserved baguette, I got through it.

Quite a few recipes came out for the recycle, and I found a couple I've now noted to make because I'd forgotten about them, raisin bread! I have raisins! and I'm Freecycling a bunch of page protectors.

At some point I need to do likewise with  several binders of knitting patterns hardly any of which I need now, with my limited current knitting arena. But not today.

Happy day everyone, if you're in the windstorms, we're just at the edge, we hope your power stays in, sez Ted and Big Ursy and Pony.

 

Tired Friday, comfort cooking

Rainy, chilly, day and I was tired. The kind of tired where you take a shower, sit and rest before drying off, rest again before dressing, go downstairs for a midmorning snack, rest again, read to the end of The Correspondent, rest, listen to a podcast while knitting, rest again. 

Anyway I had planned on making Baking on a Budget baguettes, and did so. This is my first try and it came out well. 

He's a Brit, so metric, and I had to convert all the measurements first, hence the notes, legible only to me.

In the absence of baguette pans I

created a divider with parchment paper 

And they came out lovely and crusty outside, tender inside. One's in the freezer now. Pouring boiling water into a pan one shelf lower right before baking helps make that crust.

 

 And a couple of slices went with a simple stew of cannellini beans and diced tomatoes, with tomato paste, oregano and Italian seasoning 

Definitely doing this again. It's a no-knead recipe. You have to be around because you have to prove (raise)  it twice, but the actual work on it is minimal. So it fits in with doing other tasks at home.

Next time I'll use a bit more salt, and since it needs bread flour and I only had ap, I'll add in a bit of vital wheat gluten. Maybe a pinch more of yeast, too. But it was pretty good. Bread flour has a higher protein level, more gluten and a better rise. But I can replicate that.

My energy's not high today, probably the barometric pressure. I made a strengthening smoothie with peanut butter, strawberries, milk and cane sugar. 

Happy day everyone