Nourishing:

Response to The Four's no. 25:

Baking Bread

I love to bake, probably because my first "real" job was working in the Harvest Barn at Gould Farm (an amazing place, with many stories... for another time, perhaps) where I learned how to knead dough and braid Challah, make GIGANTIC batches of Zucchini Bread and sweet Pumpkin butter, blend basil leaves into delicious pesto, grind dried mint for tea bags, bottle vinaigrettes for sale at the Roadside Store and, my favorite, churn fresh cream into butter (with a mixer of course...) Rising at 5 am to milk the cows, then showering to pick up my work crew and begin a days work of processing fresh veggies for winter, baking bread and packaging Gould Farm specialities for sale--these were some of the best days of my life...

My favorite bread recipe these days is a spin off from The Tassajara Bread Book's Oatmeal Bread. My measurements aren't exactly precise and I add ground flax seed and wheat bran to the whole wheat flour and oats so it turns out a bit different every time, but always warm to the belly and tasty with a dab of melted butter, occasionally a spoonful of jam...

(a pause and much love for the woman who taught me to bake. Her gifts have stayed with me...)