#211: B is for Bread and Butter, Blessings and Bliss
Some thoughts about my first forays into bread baking, The Tassajara Bread Book, blessings great and small, and a recipe for bread.
As a baker I identify with “B.” Bread and butter, blessings and bliss. I’ll share a bit about them all today. And when you’ve finished reading, I hope you might add your own “B’s” in the comments!
Bread and Butter
I think I made my first real loaf of bread, and by that I mean one that uses yeast, raises two or three times, and comes out of the oven to bring an overwhelming sense of home and happiness, early in my high school years. Barbara, one of my classmates in our tiny high school (there were only 24 in my graduating class), made the most beautiful (another B word) white bread. It had a beautiful loft and mushroom shape where it raised up over the top of the loaf pan during the bake. Barbara made her bread with milk, butter, AP flour, salt, and sugar. Back then I found a recipe that was close to it and started down the rabbit hole of bread baking. The house smelled so good as the dough raised, rested, baked and finally came out of the oven all hot and golden. It was hard not to tear off a steamy piece, slather it with butter and take bite after delicious bite, which I did just about every time I baked. Yum!
In 1970, when The Tassajara Bread Book by Edward Espe was first published, I became a serious flour child of a different sort (forgive the pun). His words still inspire.
“Bread makes itself, by your kindness, with your help, with imagination streaming through you, with dough under hand, you are breadmaking itself, which is why breadmaking is so fulfilling and rewarding.”
Oh, so very true. And, how often did I bake, not for me, but for others. I still do. Giving as many of you know is part of my practice. I do Pie-Bys, where I drop off pies, scones, cookies, whatevers at homes of friends. The goal, of course, it to do it without being ‘caught’ so they can be surprised. It’s such an easy thing to do. And, what do I get out of it? Wonderful stories, smiles, and thanks that fill me up to the Brim (another B!) with great happiness.
Put on that apron and get your hands in the dough. If you are looking for a recipe to start with, here’s a good one I adapted from The Joy of Cooking, another old friend in my kitchen. My copy was given to me by my mom on my 19th birthday in 1972. Now tattered & torn and full of handwritten notes and annotations, as many of my old cookbooks are, it proudly sits on the shelf devoted to classics…"‘Joy’ (or Rombauer as my mom called it), Marion Cunningham, Julia Child, James Beard, and Dorie Greenspan. I call my old friends by name when I’m in the kitchen cooking with them who ever they are. Maybe you do, too.
Blessings and Bliss
I truly feel that each day there is a Blessing waiting for each of us. Sometimes I am open to them but sometimes not. They are patient and wait to be found. They come to us in different ways. Some are ‘lesser,’ and some ‘greater.’
Lesser blessings may give us experience and life lessons. We may find them hard causing us to smack our heads while saying, OMGod/Why Me?’/I can’t do it/Not again. Greater blessings can bring abundance, ease, opportunity, happiness and Bliss.
At the age of 70, I’ve learned that as much as I want Greater blessings to stay, nothing sticks around forever, right? In my own way I cherish the good times while they are here, and know that with patience I will get through the hard times, hopefully gaining a little wisdom to share, too. Whether Lesser or Greater, I value them both.
And today dear friends, please know that I am grateful for each of you as you are all blessings in my life. May you find blessings in yours as well.
What I’m Reading
The Tassajara Bread Book by Edward Espe
A new edition came out in 2011. I still think this is a great book to learn about bread making.
The Complete Tassajara Cookbook: Recipes, Techniques, and Reflections from the Famed Zen Kitchen by Edward Espe
A basic cookbook full of easy seasonal and thoughtful recipes with some reflection thrown in, too.
The Book of Awakening by Mark Nepo
A day-book that I have read and re-read over many years.
And Watching
Maestro
Having you seen Maestro on Netflix? I grew up watching Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts but this brilliant movie is really about his wife, Felicia, and her life with this brilliant and driven man.
Person to Person hosted by Edward R Murrow: Leonard & Felicia Montealegre Bernstein (1955)
What I’m Listening To
Sisotowbell Lane by Joni Mitchell
One of my favorite songs to bake bread by.
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B is for bubble bread! This is a favorite homemade bread at our house and the process brings so much joy. Funny enough, after story hour today my son and I stopped by one of our favorite local places to pick up our go to flour for bread making.
Bloom - what good yeast does when mixed with warm water and fed by sugar or honey. I love that smell!
I adore the smell of homemade bread, still warm from the oven. I try to make a few loaves a week. And it is very hard not to take that first heel slice and slather it in butter while still warm!!