First Loaf of Bread

So this morning I check my email and find pictures.  I love it when I find pictures.

Last evening my son and his family made their first loaf of bread.  David remembered watching me knead bread when he was a kid, but just to refresh his memory, he found a YouTube video on kneading bread.  Isn't YouTube wonderful.  There is almost nothing you can't learn how to do just by searching for videos on the subject.  Anyway, Boston, the oldest,  was in charge of the kneading.

After the dough rose once in a bowl, they made it into a loaf and put it in the pan to rise.

Now comes the bad part.  The bread took longer to rise than they anticipated.  It was a school night.  The kids get up early in the morning.  So they had to go to bed before the bread was baked.  But isn't this a lovely loaf of homemade bread?  Yes it is!

I'm just so proud of them.  And it is good that they have learned a new skill that can help them feed themselves should the need arise. Or just to know how to make a treat of a loaf of homemade bread.  With lots of butter.  And homemade strawberry jam.

Drat.  Now I'm hungry.

Never, Ever Make Plans

I had planned to hop on the bus and ride it to the grocery store today.  After what seems like weeks of damnitscold weather, the prediction was for a balmy 27 degrees today.  That is on the plus side of zero - not the minus side.  I even thought about treating myself to a small bag of chocolate stars from the bulk candy section, and getting a couple of the ingredients I need to make the pooches a batch of the peanut butter treats they love so much.  And then Fate stepped in and said, "I don't think so."

Anyone who reads this blog is probably aware that a short while ago I spent time whining about the lack of heat in my apartment and voicing my opinions about the furnace guy from Hell.  I was thrilled when heat started to flow from the vents and my toes thawed out.  Well, over the weekend I noticed that something was amiss.  Even with the temperatures in the sub-zero range and the howling wind, my apartment kept getting warmer.....and warmer.....and warmer.  I can't regulate the temperature.  My landlord sets it and controls it.  But it is set at a comfortable setting.  Except that now it doesn't want to shut down.  When it reached 77 degrees I started opening windows.

Anyway, enter the furnace guy from Hell.  Right away this morning he is slogging through my apartment, checking the vents, looking at the thermostat and scratching his head.  Because I am not fond of the idea of strangers traipsing in and out while I am gone, I decided to spend the day getting caught up on fun stuff like laundry, trash hauling and floor scrubbing.  Scratch the chocolate stars, at least for today.  I will go to the store tomorrow.

Or maybe not.  Oldest son calls me a couple of times a week.  He says he just calls to see what I am doing, but I know he is calling to check up on me to make sure that I am OK.  I am grateful that he does.  Anyway, he says that there is a winter storm headed our way tomorrow.  Then, as soon as I hang up the phone, it rings again and it is youngest son.  He didn't get around to the bread baking with his kids until this evening, and he has questions.  I tell him what he needs to know about the process, and he then says that he just received a weather alert.  Part of the duties of his job have to do with managing the snow removal crews, hence the weather alert.  Seems the aforementioned winter storm is supposed to drop 3 to 6 inches of snow on us by noon tomorrow.

I think I will stop trying to plan anything in advance.  The gods of winter have a mean streak.  If I plan a day out, they drop the temp down into the freeze my keister off range or they dump snow on me.  Maybe in April...........

Coffee is the Elixir of Life

I didn't used to drink much coffee.  Just a cup now and then to be polite.  But in recent years, I find myself brewing a pot of coffee first thing in the morning, right after I feed my dogs and cat.  I prefer coffee over tea or soda.  I have never tried those "high energy" drinks that the commercials say will make me more alert and probably smarter, and if I don't use them, I will most assuredly fall asleep in my tracks about two o'clock in the afternoon.  No thank you.  I'll stick with coffee.

So my coffee stash is getting a bit low.  Time to fill the shelf.  I am not a coffee snob.  I don't need flavored gourmet coffee.  (Although, youngest son gave me some hazelnut and some chocolate flavored coffee that was awesome!) If it looks like coffee and smells like coffee and isn't bitter, it's all good.

I could go to my local grocery and buy coffee.  They have a large selection and a large price.  Dollar store coffee works just fine.  And it is on sale this week.  Six cans of the stuff will reside on my shelf tomorrow.  (After the temps warm up enough for me to stick my nose out!)  And as that won't leave a gaping hole in my budget, I probably will add another six cans the next time it goes on sale.  It is good to have rice and beans and all the other staples in food storage, but I firmly believe that in times of trouble, a person also needs some of the familiar comfort items, and coffee fills that bill for me.  (That and a goodly supply of chocolate.)

I don't need to spend a ton of money on fancy coffee makers, either.  Years ago my Dad gave me this one.

I don't know what the real name of this style of coffee pot is, but he always called it a "drip-o-lator."  I wonder if that is even a word.  This coffee pot has been around at least as long as I have been, and that is a long time.  We are both showing our age.  I think my parents got it when they were first married in 1945.  Over the years I have had a series of Mr. Coffee type electric coffee makers.  And one by one, each has died.  This silly coffee pot will probably out last me.  And it makes better coffee than the fancy electric ones with their clocks and timers and buttons and digital numbers that always flash "12:00" because I can't seem to program them correctly.

So now, if you will excuse me, my cup is empty and that is not a good thing.

Winter Day Ramblings

French toast made with Grandmother Bread, topped with butter and homemade plum jam.  Bacon on the side.  A cup of fresh brewed coffee.  Two dogs of the ankle-biting variety cruising my kitchen in hopes of a piece of bacon coming their way.  Fat Cat stretched out on top of the chest freezer, patiently waiting to supervise whatever action is happening in the kitchen today.  Life doesn't get much better than this.

I know I said that I wasn't going to talk about the weather any more, but damn!  It is 10:30 AM and it is still minus 14 degrees outside, with a wind chill of minus 37 degrees.  Here in town we don't have the white-out conditions of blowing and drifting snow like they do on the open prairie.  I live in an old building with walls that are maybe 8 inches thick.  I can still hear the wind howling down the alleys and around the corners.  City Hall is right across the street.  The flag on top of that building isn't waving like flags in the wind usually do.  It appears stiff as a board.

You know those dust devils that you see in the summertime?  Where the wind picks up dust from the fields and swirls it around like mini tornadoes.  I look out my window and watch snow devils dancing across the roof of the building next to City Hall.  It looks like the building could be on fire, but it is not.  Warm air escaping from doors and windows freezes immediately and looks like plumes of smoke.  I am glad my building has thick walls and lots of insulation.

Even with the cold and wind, my apartment stays toasty.  And I am ever so glad that I spent all of those hours canning food last summer and fall, for I want for nothing.  The only thing I have run out of that I can't make for myself is yarn.  I am working on a couple of afghans and I used up the last of the colors of yarn for those projects.  But that can wait until the temperatures get above the zero mark again.  I still have lots to keep me busy.

I hear other retirees complain about being bored.  I am never bored.  I seem to never have lost my yearning for learning.  When a subject catches my interest, I can spend hours in online research.  Last week I learned how to make some types of cheese from the powdered milk I keep in stock.  Before that I found all sorts of information on healing herbs and how to use them.  This week I am looking for tutorials on how to crochet scarves and mittens, to use up the leftover yarn from the afghan projects.  And after that I want to find recipes to make things like my own taco seasoning or pumpkin pie spice or other combination seasonings I can make from the basic seasonings I keep on the shelf.  And as a bonus, I stumbled across a YouTube channel with a bucket load of hour long Sherlock Holmes mysteries.  Yippie Ki-Yay!  I can watch those in the evening while I crochet or sew.  There is always something.  How can a person ever be bored?

And now I think I have rambled on enough - or too much - depending on your point of view!  On to the little dab of housework that awaits my attention, and then the fun stuff.  Even with the cold and wind, my life here in the frozen north is pretty darned good.  Oh, I still get worked up over the insanities in the world around me. Our government officials in particular tend to tick me off.  Even though I never forget the threats to our freedoms and the threats to our way of life that we cherish and I continue to prepare, I choose to enjoy my life as much as possible.  Those words, "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" are as true today as they were when written.  And I believe in them.

A Good Bread Baking Day

While the wind blows and the snow swirls around, everything is toasty warm here in my little corner of the world.  I just got off the phone with youngest son who is out helping his crews move snow.  He asked what I was doing today and I replied that it was a good day to bake bread.  He said that he would be home in a couple of hours and would like his kids to learn to bake bread, but that he had never tried that skill.  He remembered watching me knead bread when he was a kid.  He wanted to know if I had a good recipe.  Because my email has been a bit wonky lately, I told him that I would post the recipe here.  Perhaps someone else will find it useful, too.

This is the recipe that I use most often.  It makes a good tasting loaf and requires only basic ingredients.  I got the recipe from Suzanne McMinn's blog, "Chickens in the Road," and have included her instructions, word for word.

"Grandmother Bread
Submitted by: Suzanne McMinn
Deliciously simple and simply delicious, Grandmother Bread is a daily staple in our farmhouse. This is a heritage recipe, tested by time and the hands of mothers and grandmothers for over a hundred years. This secret family recipe is different from many standard white bread recipes in that it contains no milk, egg, or oil, and its very simplicity produces a bread of light but sturdy texture that yields loaves for perfectly sliced sandwich bread (the best sandwich bread you’ll ever taste! also makes excellent french toast!), plus the same dough can be used to create dinner rolls, cinnamon-swirl loaves, sweet rolls, crispies, and apple-strudel ladder loaf.

Once you’ve grasped the concept of the standard Grandmother Bread recipe, you can create variations of your own–the possibilities are limitless!

Two-loaf standard recipe

3 cups warm water
1 tablespoon yeast (1 packet)
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup sugar
7 cups all-purpose flour

One-loaf standard recipe

1 1/2 cups warm water
1 teaspoon yeast
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
3 1/2 cups flour

See step by step instructions on How to Make Bread:
In a large bowl, combine water, yeast, sugar, and salt. Let sit five minutes.
Stir in first three cups of flour with a heavy spoon. Add the next cup of flour a little at a time as needed, stirring until dough becomes too stiff to continue stirring easily. Add a little more flour and begin kneading. The amount of flour is approximate–your mileage may vary! Continue adding flour and kneading until the dough is smooth and elastic.
Let dough rise in a greased, covered bowl until doubled. (Usually, about an hour.) Uncover bowl; sprinkle in a little more flour and knead again before dividing in half. With floured hands, shape dough into loaves and place in two greased loaf pans. Tear off two pieces of waxed paper and grease with oil spray (to prevent it from sticking to the loaves as they rise) and cover loaf pans. Let rise till loaves are tall and beautiful! (About an hour, depending on the temperature in your kitchen.)
Bake for 25 minutes in a preheated 350-degree oven."

The only thing I don't do is use the waxed paper to cover the loaves while they raise.  A clean dish towel works fine for me.  And I will add that when tapping on the loaf produces a hollow sound, the bread is done.

It does my heart good to see skills like bread baking passed down from one generation to the next.  I am grateful that my mother taught me as it is a skill that I use every week.  Today I can make my own bread and I don't have to brave the cold and the wind just to go to a store for a loaf.  And it just tastes so good.

To my grandkids - let me know how your bread turns out.  I know it will be good.  Make sure Mom and Dad give each of you a slice with lots of butter while it is still warm.  And have fun!

Love, Grandma

Yes, It Did Freeze Over

It is January.  It is Minnesota.  It's not like this is anything new.  So that is the last I am going to say about the cold.  It is time to think Spring.

Ah, yes.  Much better!

Sunshine Through My Windows

So this morning, I'm a happy camper.  There is this big yellow ball in the eastern sky.  Haven't seen it for a while.  Sunlight is streaming through my living room windows.  The cat has positioned herself to take full advantage of a sunbeam.  Even the dogs seem more energetic.  Lily has gathered half a dozen small tennis balls, waiting for me to toss them.  She won't bring them back to me, but she loves chasing them, and that is enough.  Jesse Jane, "she of little energy and big appetite," is cruising the kitchen, waiting for me to cook or bake something, and possibly drop some tidbit on the floor for her to snag.

Then I check the latest weather report.


"Minnesota Issues Blizzard Warning."


Here in the Frozen North, it doesn't have to be snowing to create a blizzard.  It is enough that an inch or two of fluffy cold white stuff fell yesterday.  The winds are picking up and will blow the snow around later today.  And temps will again drop from a few degrees above zero back down to -15.

Sigh.