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Where I've been

Hopefully more than a few of my readers have been asking this question and haven't abandoned my blog for good, as it might have appeared I did. At the beginning of summer, on top of all the other stuff that was happening, there was a death in my family. Then, my fridge slowly stopped working. Then, my work scheduled turned upside down. Then... then... then... well, fill in the blanks, and it probably could sound like anybody else you know. Everyone's life seems to be affected by some extraordinary situation, and priorities shift and change. Unfortunately, I left this blog with one awful quick-and-dirty post just to get some material up. When I came back to the blog and saw that somewhat embarrassing photo, I cringed enough to remove the post. As I had alluded to in the blog description, my meals aren't always beautiful and photo-worthy. I should have listened to myself and skipped the illustrations, though, what is a good post these days without something nice to

Out of Flour

I knew it. When I was at the store the other day, I said to myself that I'd get flour when I make my "real " grocery trip... certainly not now. I was only picking up a few things. So finally I got around to making my next loaf, and sure enough, I only had just over a cup of flour. So much for efficiency. My internal dialog of justifications is such a pain in the butt sometimes. As Oliver Hardy would say to Stan Laurel, "Well, here's another nice mess you've gotten me into." I need bread. I'm tired of eating potatoes and rice for my starch component. I can't make a ham sandwich on crackers or potato slabs (I mean, I could). I have been experimenting with my bread recipe, tweaking it for lean times such as these. Do I really need 4 cups of flour? Can I make up for a reduction in diastatic power with something else or get by without it? Well, I had gotten some mixed sorghum-rice-millet flour a while back to cut into my bread recipes, kno

Baking Bread!

I had heard them all. All the discouraging but well-meant things about making bread at home, having to wait and let dough rise, flour everywhere, needing a dough hook and a stand mixer, and getting better than a good workout. "Baking is difficult." "Baking is tricky." "Ooh, baking bread, you really gotta know what you're doing!" This kept me away, which is unusual. The more esoteric a process and its arcane methods, the better by me. At some point in the last couple years, I REALLY got tired of paying too much for a loaf of decent bread. Stores sell a lot of good-looking breads, and especially so, in their store bakeries. How many times have you been all amped-up for a gorgeous sandwich you made at home on one of these breads? You're thinking, "I don't need to go to a restaurant. I could be a chef! Just look at this thing!" The lettuce is bright green and offset by gleaming orange cheese and a blistering red tomato slic

The Occasional Chef

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