Feeding on Air: the Sourdough Life

Today I start school again, and this blog, as it stands, shall end.

My training to become a Drama and Movement Therapist is intense and full time, and the few other projects I have germinating will require all the extra attention I have.

Here is a fundraiser for one of my projects.  Leave a comment to order a loaf!

This is one of the other projects. Leave a comment if you’d like to buy a loaf!

I’ve fiddled with lots of food that I still want to write about. Autumn abundance too is tempting me away from my decision to pause, or at least change, this blog.  But it’s sell-by date has come.

I started writing as The Waiting Artist in a fit of desperate, unemployed boredom.  It turned into a food blog thanks to the pitiable state of English store-bought bread, and my subsequent (and good!) attempts to bake my own.  In the three years I’ve written, I’ve had lots of shitty jobs, and a few good ones.  I’ve baked my daily bread, and written a steady stream of essays and recipes.

Writing about food atuned me to the lessons I can learn from it, so let me take a tip from the sourdough quietly bubbling on my counter:

She sits there, unconsciously cultivating a colony of bacteria that mix and ferment and froth and grow.  She absorbs them from the air, taking in all that the atmosphere offers, without knowing which dough her specific mulch of  enzymes will ultimately be kneaded into, will be needed by to rise into something tangy and crusty and new.

My blog will change.  I will post less frequently.  I will focus less exclusively on food.  But I will write.  When I have time.  When I start to understand the fecundity this fresh air breathes in.

Something from the Sky, Something from the Sea: Quail’s Eggs, Winkles and Whelks

I only assembled this starter because I liked the beauty of the speckled eggs in contrast to the sea-mottled molluscs.  And the pleasing symmetry of three different treats from three different shells.

I say assembled, and not cooked, because all it takes is five minutes of boiling.  The eggs go in for 4.5 minutes, and are then shocked under or in cold water.  The cold whelks get tipped into a fast simmer.  They immediately cool the water.  Allow the pot return to a full boil, then drain.  Add the winkles about 2 minutes after the whelks.

The molluscs improve if you cook them in a mixture of half water and half dry wine with a bay leaf and some chopped up celery.  The eggs are nice dabbed in celery salt.

Goes best with a stiff, clear drink.  I’d choose a Sipsmith’s gin martini.

Sauer Macht Lustig: Red Currant-Limeade

“Sauer macht lustig,” my father would say to me as I bit into super-sour Haribo French Fries, wincing as the acid kick hit my jaw.  And thus I always assumed “sour makes funny”, which is the inelegant but literal translation of the German saying, referred to the faces people make when they bite into tangy treats.

A quick google, however, revealed that it is most likely a shortening of the older “Sauer macht gelüstig”, meaning that sour things make you keen, hungry, eager, full of all kinds of appetite.  That explains why so many cocktails are sour:  to arouse hunger for the meal to follow, or for your date.

Sour is a summery zing of flavour.  It refreshes as much as it awakens yours cravings, and it’s pucker is as often balanced by nostalgia as it is heightened by anticipation.  I only ever ate those sour Haribos sitting on a damp towel in the back seat, chlorinated hair whipped by the wind from the wide-open windows as we drove home from the pool.  And just think of homemade lemonade.  Or better yet, pink lemonade.

Whether you want to indulge your sentimentality or stoke your fires, this recipe is a good one, and sour enough for a first-sip-funny-face.

Red Currant-Limeade

This makes an excellent nonalcoholic cocktail as it is more sour than sweet, more complex than regular lemonade, and a beautiful pink.  Cutting back on alcohol consumption is often a good thing, but omitting the ritual of a drink to mark the end of a day’s work and the beginning of an evening’s relaxation never is.  And anyway, you can always add gin and call it a Pink Collins.

per person:

Juice of 2 Limes (a staple of summer)

A small handful of Red Currants (these are local and in season now if you live in England or similar climes)

Simple Syrup or Sweetener to Taste (start with 1 TBLSP of simple syrup.  It’s easy to add more later)

Put all ingredients in a cocktail shaker with 4 large cubes of ice.  Shake vigorously.  (If you only have small or rounded ice cubes, you will need to muddle the currants before shaking.  Large cubes will crush them and release the pink just through shaking.)

Pour into a tall glass, with the ice or over fresh ice.  Top up with plain or sparkling water.  Adjust sweetness to taste.  Garnish with a sprig of currants or a slice of lime.

 

Holiday Essential: Love Letter to my Pocket Knife

Mr. B and I just returned from Jersey where we biked, hiked, swam, and spent all day every day in the sunny, salty wind.

Each night we would come home to our self-catering flat hungry and laden with just dug potatoes and boat-fresh crustaceans.  We could have done nothing but boiled what we had and still feasted, but our pleasures of the kitchen were even greater because I anticipated the dull bane of all holiday rentals: knives so blunt they couldn’t cut cold butter.  I packed my Opinel folding knife, and we got to enjoy Jersey, chopped onions, sliced tomatoes, slivers of dried sausage and all.

hiking food

Go out an buy yourself one!  It’s the best pocket knife you can get:  a holiday saver, and in a pinch, probably even a life saver if you have to remove vicious splinters or saw off an arm trapped under a rock.

post hiking food
The kitchen, though equipped only with dull blades, did have a whisk, so the mayonnaise on our just-off the boat lobsters was whipped up by Mr. B.

Beach Food: Methods for Kipper Mousse and Coleslaw

Stop looking at me with those beady eyes.

I know I’ve bee remiss; a lazy blogger; a reluctant cook.  I’ve been uninspired!  I’m a bit burnt-out.  Everyone needs a vacation.  And I’m taking one!  And while I’m away, you reproachful-eyed kipper, I’m going to make paté of you and your expectations, and eat them on the beach.  So there.

Mackerel Mousse for Burnt-Out Bloggers

To be packed into a rucksack and eaten on the beach.

Place 1 Kipper per 2 servings in a heat-proof container and pour boiling water over it.  Let sit for 10 minutes.  (It will curl up in shock, and might stared up at you.  But stop anthropomorphizing!  He’s already dead, and also sustainable!  Incidentally, this process is called jugging.  Do it in a jug for maximum authenticity.)

Remove from water and when cool enough to handle (this will be almost immediately if you have un-ladylike cook/waitress/cyclist hands like me) and remove the flesh from the bones.  Blend with a generous dollop (about 2 heaped tablespoons) of Crème Fraîche or Sour Cream, 2 heaped tsps. of Horseradish (not horseradish cream, unless that’s all there is, in which case, add a bit more for punch) and 1-2 tblsps Lemon Juice.  That’s it.  Capers make a nice addition if you want to fancy it up, as do cornichons.

Serve on bread, with veggies, by the spoonful; whatever you holiday appetite dictates.

—-

You can balance your meal out with some

Coleslaw

 

For this, I won’t even offer a method, much less a recipe.  I just have some tips:

Celery makes and excellent addition.

So do Radishes, Carrots and a very Small Amount of Very Finely Sliced Tomatoes.

Mix the Colours of Your Cabbages: purple, white, various greens.

Soak Very Finely Diced Red Onion in Apple Vinegar for 20 Minutes, then add to the slaw.

If using mayonnaise, balance the richness with Harissa or Lots of Lemon Juice, or Both.

Salt Before Dressing.

A Pinch of Sugar really brings the flavours out.

And what really, really brings the flavours out?  Being tossed around in your bag while you hike all morning to the perfect picnic spot.

 

 

The Potential of Imperfection: Sorbet from Almost Rotten Berries

Perfectionism is anathema to a life well-lived, a meal well-cooked or an opportunity properly seized.

So next time you pass a basket of peaky-looking strawberries being flogged off cheap before they rot, nab those faulty fuckers.  Because there is sweet potential masked in imperfection.

I made sorbet with mine.

It was simpler to make and purer in taste because the berries were overripe and easily bruised.

Strawberry Sorbet Recipe

All I did was pull off the green tops, slice out the few spots which had passed beyond wanton softness into rotten, and slice the fruit in half.  Then I sprinkled sugar over their surfaces, about 2 tblsp for 5 cups of strawberries.  Just enough for the granules to give a quick sparkle before dissolving.  I let the berries sit for 15 minutes, allowing the sugar to draw out some juice, then I purée the mess and churned it in my ice-cream maker for 50 minutes.¹

From those flawed berries came perfect sorbet, whose deliciousness was heightened further when I spooned on a touch of rhubarb vodka.

 The lesson to ponder while you savouryour treat?  That there are chances beyond the most obvious ones.  That some things get sweeter with age.  That the prettiest specimens are not the best for all purposes.  That even when giving up seems like the most logical solution, you are probably not really ready for the compost heap.  That a prudently administered dose of alcohol when you are feeling bruised and used up can work wonders.  That there is a recipe for everything, and that mustering up the will to continue experimenting will invariably lead to some kind of success.

And with these homilies, I leave you to your kitchens and your crises.

—–

Note:  Right after churning, the sorbet will have a lovely, but very soft texture.  If you want to be able to form firm scoops, let it sit in a freezer for about an hour.  If you don’t finish it all in one sitting and store the sorbet in the freezer, be sure to remove it from the freezer about 40 minutes before serving, to allow the sorbet to soften a bit.

¹ If you don’t have an ice-cream maker, don’t despair!  (In fact:  Just don’t despair at all!  That’s the point of this post.)  You can still have your sorbet.  Just spoon the mixture into a flat-ish container and put it in the freezer.  Every 1/2 hour or so, stir with a fork.  In about 3 hours, you will have sorbet.  It will be grainier in texture than if you had churned it in a machine, but still delicious.  And if you forget a few stirs and the mixture freezes flaky, just call it granita.

Grist for the Mill: Homegrown Lettuce

The lettuce seeds I planted in a corner of a friend’s overgrown and unused garden are the only creatures I know who have taken to these three months of rain:

Mr. B and I had these homegrown leaves in a delicious salad, simply dressed.  It was a bright spot lightening a prolonged “nasty phase” that I’m solely responsible for but that I can’t seem to shake.  Jules Renard, from whom I stole the moniker for this damp, chill mood, explains the state best:

I am going through a nasty phase.  All books disgust me.  I do nothing.  I notice more than ever that I am of no use.  I feel that I shall not get anywhere… How to get out of here?  I have one expedient:  hypocrisy.  I remain locked up for hours and people think I am working.  Some may be sorry for me, others admire me, and I am bored, and I yawn, my eyes full of jaundiced reflections from the yellow of my bookcase.  I have a wife who is a strong and gentle creature full of a life, a baby who could take prizes in a contest, and I have no strength to enjoy all that.  I know that this mood will pass.  I shall have hopes again, and new braveries, and I will make brand-new efforts.  If only these confessions were of some use to me!  If later I could become a great philologist…  But I do not believe that I possess enough power.  I shall die before my time, or else become a drunkard of day-dreams.  Better to break stones, to plow fields.  And shall I spend the rest of my life saying:  Better to turn to something else?  Why this seesawing of our soul, this coming and going of enthusiasms?  Our hopes are like the waves of the sea:  when they withdraw, they leave uncovered a mess of sickening objects, foul shells and crabs, stinking moral crabs forgotten on this beach, that now drag themselves sideways to catch up with the sea.  How sterile the life of a write who doesn’t get there!  Goodness, I’m intelligent… But this intelligence is like water running, unknown, unused, in some region where no one has yet built a mill.  Yes, that is it:  I have not yet found my mill.  Shall I ever find it?

I may not have found my mill, but I’ve found a patch of dirt to wallow in and see what grows.

(Fingers crossed that the sun-loving squash haven’t offed themselves.)

While I Was Away…

I went to Portugal.

I ate some creatures:

And some creatures ate me:

Some creatures ate others:

Recipes for creatures other than myself coming soon.

On Nonsense: Recipe for Rhubarb Vodka Included

Rhabarber, rhabarber!

The stalks of English rhubarb appearing weekly in my Riverford veggie box mirror my mood of the past weeks.  I’m in a holding pattern, waiting for the next big project to begin, and can just barely cling to the belief that there is a point to getting up in the morning.  I am pretending to make sense, muttering metaphorical “Rhabarber! Rhabarber!” as much to myself as anyone else.

What flight is this fool on?  What on Earth am I talking about?

“Rhabarber, rhabarber,” is what, traditionally, a troupe of German actors will mutter to each other if they are portraying an interested or agitated crowd.  It mimics the sound of rumours beginning to fly, or rabble being roused.  (The English sometimes say “Rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb.”  I have never heard an American actor allude to this practice.)

Reputedly, it was first used by the Meininger (the acting troupe of Meiningen, Germany, lead by the Duke George II of Sachsen-Meiningen from 1869-1874) in their landmark production of Julius Caesar, in which the troupe not only muttered rhubarb to each other in an imitation of sense, but also exited on one side of the stage and entered on the other over and over again to mimic a enormous, ever-growing crowd amassing to hear Brutus and Mark Antony eulogize Caesar.  It must have been effective.  The Meininger’s revolutionary stage techniques are still recorded in Theatre History books.  I even wrote a paper on it.

In my doldrums, the idea of one small group exchanging heated nonsense and eternally arriving at the same scene in an imitation of significance is enough to drive me to drink, or to bed.   Or back to the kitchen, where I can reliably find my creativity and a sense of accomplishment no matter what my mood.

Rhubarb Vodka

In a blender or mortar and pestle, mash:

4 Stalks of Rhubarb

1/2 a cup of Sugar

Cover this with 2 cups of vodka.

Place in a jar and allow to sit for one to four weeks, then strain through cheesecloth and add to your liquor cabinet.

Mine has been sitting for one week and already tastes very rhubarby, but I’ll give it a little more time to intensify.  I like seeing it on my window sill, a reminder that even when I am biding time till a new phase begins, things are happening:  flavour is infusing and even my under-stimulated mind continues to think.

(On the other hand, I am making rhubarb vodka and lord knows I talk even more nonsense after a few drinks.)

The vodka on day one. It’s much pinker than that now.

K.I.S.S.! (In Praise of Simple Suppers and New Potatoes)

K.I.S.S.! of course means “Keep it simple, stupid!”

I have a theory I want to get onto paper.  I’m plotting another play.  I am counting the weeks until I go back to school, and coming up with increasingly wild ideas for how to fund it.  All of me has been focused towards the future, fueled too much by ambition.  I have been so distracted by dreams that I’ve let my concentration on the tasks and pleasures of the present stray.

After an afternoon of trying to work, I escaped the blank screen and the financial worries looming up at me from my computer and walked to the market to find something for dinner.  Feeling as dirt-caked, earth bound and unassuming as the Jersey Royal Potatoes spilling out of their crates at the vegetable stands, I bought a pound and decided I would eat my mood for dinner.  I scrubbed them, steamed them, chopped some scallions and pickles into mayonnaise and added a boiled egg.

I sat down to the simplest and best dinner I have had in a long time.  I poured a glass of wine and toasted those delicious jewels that emerged from the mud, persistent even if their season is late due to unusual cold and unexpected rain.  That’s the metaphor I decided to ingest while eating my changing mood.