Sourdough, and a Duck

In the same way that spring triggers a hormonal response in my call ducks, the reduced light and cooler weather of autumn subtly changes me. No longer do I want to spend every waking hour in the garden or outside; painting, baking, reading and knitting become my activities of choice.

Having discovered this recipe from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall thought I'd resurrect the idea of a starter to ring a change from the regular bread I usually make (I can't bear sliced supermarket bread although the children love it. Why??) and even though my previous attempts a few years ago weren't terribly successful, well - nothing ventured etc. I do sometimes struggle with the idea of yet another thing to look after and try and keep happy and content with daily ministrations but this recipe gives some hints as to how to forgo that occasionally so I can have a few days off from parenting a jar of fermenting gloop...

Of course, the first go is always going to be tricky and I realised it has a whole different rhythm to regular bread so didn't complement my other baking I was doing regarding oven use and me having to go out at one point but - BUT! I followed the recipe exactly, no short cuts or 'clever' ideas, and wow, it is just like sourdough! I'm thinking a proving basket would be a nice Christmas present now.

Just out of the oven

Cut to reveal texture
(And so I could eat the crust slathered with butter)

I was really pleased!

With less demands on the poultry and bee front (although I am putting together a Beehive Adoption plan to roll out next year - more of that on my other blog, WaywardBee) I've picked up my watercolours again. I love painting, largely because as yet I don't have any sort of neurotic perfectionist agenda with it and simply enjoy the process. I copy photos, am seriously lacking in any technical ability and never plan or think through what I'm trying to achieve. I get so absorbed in observing what I'm painting though and have some excellent watercolours which are a pleasure to work with so despite the lack of frame-able results I can easily spend an hour happily entertained and still feel pleased with what I've managed to produce:

Bread

I was listening to a very interesting Radio 4 Food Programme podcast about Yeast the other day and they were saying how modern bread is all about speed of manufacture, and how our forebears made bread using the froth from fermenting ale called 'ale barm': here is some information but the discussion was also about how sourdough and other such slow breads are much more digestible as the yeast has already partly processed the grain. I have made sourdough before using a starter but as my bread making was more sporadic in those days, it used to die before I could use it. Anyway I treated myself to some organic stoneground spelt flour and mixed it - whisked it actually to incorporate more oxygen - with still mineral water, and added more water and flour in increasing quantities every day until after about 5 days, it started to bubble and froth:

You can't really follow a regular bread recipe as by adding the starter instead of dried yeast, there is additional water and flour but into the KitchenAid went about 800 grams of flour, 3 ladlefuls of starter, a teaspoon of salt and about 400 ml of warm water with a teaspoon of honey mixed in:

I let it rise in the airing cupboard for about half the day by which time it was puffy but much 'wetter' than normal dough:

 I poured it into tins and left it to rise again for a few more hours then baked it in a hot oven for about 30 minutes as I would with a normal loaf.

Here are the finished articles:

It's delicious and tastes exactly like the ones I normally pay £3.50 a loaf for at  Bill's! I topped the starter up with more flour and water and gave it another whisk and if I keep feeding it I can carry on making more loaves.

Charles had a day off today so we went to Middle Farm with the children and as well as flapjacks and a pie for lunch I got some new food for the chicks - it's quite expensive but a very good make called Garvo and I decided to get some for the big hens to try too, which they seemed to really like.

We went and got some wood to make a bigger run for the new duckles as the broody coop is not only rather small but the area where I let them out doesn't have a roof. This means that Maud and Mary hop in and nick their food and also a fox could easily jump over :-( so having visited the wood merchants we got to work sawing, drilling and screwdriving until they latter two ran out of charge and we got a bit lost as to what we were doing. My plans were rather sketchy to say the least so we had to keep adjusting the measurements accordingly. I don't have any photos but hopefully if the dry weather continues I should get it finished over the weekend.

I have been given 2 magnolia seedheads by my family to propagate; I love them, they are amazing:

They have scales rather than seeds as they are amongst the earliest species of flowering plants, and evolved to be pollinated by beetles hence their large, robust flowers. I need to leave them to dry and then rub off their waterproof coating, then hopefully they might germinate. I love the diversity of plants, and listened to a brilliant lecture from Yale about plants and animals which I sort of told myself was revision. It's not, really...