The long, cold winters of America’s Siberia, otherwise known as Minnesota, offer plenty of time to hunker down indoors, pick up new hobbies, or revisit old ones. Lately, I’ve rekindled my love for baking bread. I can’t quite explain why it brings me so much joy. Perhaps it’s in my DNA. My Mom tells me she had an uncle who loved to bake, so maybe it runs in the family.
Like many others during the pandemic, I joined the sourdough craze. As much as I enjoy sourdough, keeping a starter alive felt like nearly as much responsibility as having a pet without the tail wagging and unconditional love. After scouring the internet for a shortcut, I stumbled upon a peculiar suggestion on Reddit: using kefir as a substitute for a sourdough starter. Supposedly, the probiotics in kefir could provide the necessary leavening. Intrigued, I had to give it a shot.
As you can see from the picture above it was a huge fail. Reddit is good for a lot of things but, apparently, recipes aren’t one of them. As you can see this loaf looked more like a UFO than bread and it weighed about two pounds. It probably could have used by an Olympic discus thrower. I decided the best use for this was to break it apart into small pieces and feed them. To my surprise, even the birds but they wouldn’t touch it!
Next, I decided to try my hand at Irish Soda bread in my new cast iron bread pan. I didn’t even know cast iron baking pans existed until a week ago but it performed flawlessly. The Lodge brand comes pre-seasoned with oil so the loaf slipped right out.
This soda bread was served with nearly every meal we had on our trip to Ireland a few years ago and I grew to love it. I feel like I redeemed myself somewhat with this loaf. Eating this, smothered with butter, brought me right back to our time on the Emerald Isle.
You might remember that my wife and I moved about twenty minutes outside the city a few months ago. Life on the outskirts has been wonderfully peaceful, and the quiet is a welcome change. Over the past few weeks, we’ve spotted deer, bald eagles, and all kinds of wildlife wandering through the neighborhood.
But a few days ago, I opened the blinds and was caught off guard by this unexpected visitor in the field behind our house.
After a little research we learned the coyote pack will send a solitary scout out as bait to try to lure unsuspecting animals to chase them. Somewhere nearby the pack lies in waiting to attack whatever unfortunate animal gives chase, which is usually someones pet. We'll have to remember this when we get another dog. It's like the wild kingdom out here. Even the coyote wouldn't touch the bread.
If you’re looking for something good to watch this weekend do yourself a favor and give this film a shot. We watched it last night and it was absolutely superb.
Although the plot was far from light-hearted, it was refreshing to see a mainstream film that wasn’t overtly violent or painted some dystopian future for humanity. If Kieran Culkin doesn’t win a shelf full of awards for this film Hollywood is even more out-of-touch than even I suspected.
~Eric Vance Walton~
Enjoy the weekend everyone!
(Photos are original.)
