Bread and Butter

A Loon's Spoon Post

I love French bread and I have almost got the process where I want it - thanks to the Master Recipe: Boule and directions in Jeff Hertzberg's and Zoe Francois' book Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day.

In the morning I mix 6 cups lukewarm water, 1.5 tablespoons yeast, 1.5 teaspoons kosher salt and 6.5 cups of flour together right in my food storage container.

Then, I cover it and carry it into the Snuggery, this is the warmest room in the house and a great place to let the dough rise for 2 hours. The Snuggery is also my office and a favorite place for all 3 dogs to hang out when I'm working.  I am very careful to keep the dough away from the dogs and never leave the dogs and the dough alone - it's just not a good combination and I speak from experience.

After 2 hours or so the container is moved to the refrigerator until I want to use it.

Refrigerating the dough, for at lest 3 hours, makes it less sticky and a lot easier to work with.  About an hour and a half before I want to have warm bread I remove the dough from the refrigerator and form it into loaves.

I place the loaves on parchment paper and use perforated French bread pans that my mother-in-law, Gwen, gave me from Williams-Sonoma. Then, they go back to the Snuggery for 40 minutes to rise.  After about 20 minutes I preheat the oven to 450 degrees and place a low sided pan, I think it's the oven's broiling pan, on a low rack filled with water.  This will create a steam environment, which is GREAT for producing a crisp crust.

The dough goes into the oven for about 30 minutes.  First, I brush the loaves with tap water to help with a crusty crust.

After 30 minutes, or so, the bread comes out of the oven and is ready to eat.  WARNING: Keep it way far away from counter-surfing Weimaraners.  Again, speaking from experience, they have been know to take the whole loaf in the blink of an eye.

I love butter and on this point I agree with Julia.  Unfortunately, butter is not part of a plant-based diet.

Neither, is cream.

So, I decided to try one of the butter substitutes that have come out since my last round as a vegan.  Earth Balance products have received excellent reviews from the vegetarian/vegan communities.

I think I picked the wrong product.  I bought the sticks and they're more of a baking product.  It didn't taste so great spread on the bread.  Earth Balance offers a number of different spreads and I think that's the route I should have taken if I wanted to "butter" my bread.  

You know what? I've ALWAYS been a fan of olive oil.  Dipping French bread in plain or flavored olive oils beats butter in my book.

Sweet Potatoes and Tahini

A Loon's Spoon Posting

There is a lot of help online for vegans.  In just a few minutes I found some amazing blogs and recipe sites with beautiful pictures and easy recipes.  Just last night there was a Facebook post pointing me to the Top 50 Vegan Blogs.  One of the first blogs I ran across I really loved - great name, great photos, fun commentary and a mix of recipes - This Raswsome Vegan Life written by Emily, you can can her Em.  Her philosphy is similar to mine.  She writes, 

". . .With the knowledge I've learned about what animal products do to me, you, our earth, and our beloved fellow animals - I choose not to put anything that has caused suffering in my body. My lunch shouldn't require murder. In any case, humans can certainly thrive without eating animals. Being vegan simply means caring about others."

I found an easy recipe for baked yams and tahini on her blog and since I had some organic sweet potatoes just waiting around for something to do I decided to try it.

Well, the sweet potatoes were good, but I think I have to find a better tahini source.  It was thick and globby from a jar (I won't reveal the brand).  I  had a great tahini sauce from au Bon appetit that I brought back from Milwaukee, but it's all gone.

So, my sweet potatoes ended up like this - note the tahini glob on the top.

Again, the potatoes were great, but the drizzled tahani effect didn't work out and it didn't taste great.

Asher thought it was all great!

Launching the Loon's Spoon

A Loon's Spoon Posting

Today, in honor of Earth Day, I am going back to a plant-based diet.

I was inspired by two books: Dearie: The Remarkable Life of Julia Child and Living the Farm Sanctuary Life.  Oddly enough I read the books at the same time, starting with Bob Spitz' Dearie, then looking for a break from Julia's recipe wrestling I turned to the table of Contents of my Kindle.  Gene Baur's book on the Farm Sanctuary he founded had magically appeared on my device while I wasn't paying attention; I pre-ordered the ebook about a month before its publish date.

Both books portray people passionate about food, where it comes from, its preparation and how it is enjoyed. I don't think anyone would call Julia Child a vegetarian and Gene Baur is definitely a vegan, but both inspired me to think more about food and eating. I guess the popular term is mindful eating.  Mindful eating is eating with intention and attention - a practice that harkens back to Buddha, but has gained popularity today with organizations like the Center for Mindful Eating and a dozen, or so, books listed on Amazon.com.

After reading about the philosophy and practices of the Farm Sanctuary in Baur's book I am convinced that a plant-based diet is the only diet in keeping with the compassionate, sustainable lifestyle I desire. I knew this 30 years ago when I was a vegan, but then things got tough and it was easier to eat fish from time to time and welcome CHEESE! back into my diet.

The pictures and stories of these animals, the animals at the Farm Sanctuary , convince me to focus on a plant-based diet and stay clear of animal-based products.

According to Baur it isn't enough to just stop eating animal products, you should let others know what and why you're doing it.  Inspire change when and where you can.  At Farm Sanctuary they ". . .engage people where they are on their journey to a cruelty-free lifestyle".  They advocate that, "All human and nonhuman animals should be treated with compassion and respect" and support incremental change.  I like that idea - set an example, be informative, yet respectful.

My interrupted journey is now back on track. More Loon's Spoon postings to follow.