Crafty Girl

We built a chicken coop this fall for our new hens. Here it is in it’s half completed state.

We finally finished it 2 weeks ago. Just in time for…Eggs! The one on the right is a store bought egg and it’s quite a bit larger. Hopefully the egg size will increase as the hens mature.

We have tons and tons of hamburger from raising cows. It only took 5 years, but we finally realized we could make sausage with it. We’re both big fans of all kinds of sausage. Bill made a smoked all beef summer sausage. MMM, it’s delicious.

I’ve been working with sourdough for about a month now. I’m still not getting quite the rise I want, but I am producing edible bread. Could be because I’m using not using any white flour or vital wheat gluten. I’m pretty good with making bread with dry yeast, so this whole not producing totally awesome bread in kind of disheartening. Makes me want to add some dry yeast to the dough along with the sourdough starter.

Today I made english muffins. As always, I subbed whole wheat for the white flour. They turned out very tasty, but lacked all the air pockets I was hoping for. I still have about 10 raising, so maybe they’ll turn out better. But for now, we’re heading in to town to investigate wood burning stoves and make a trip to the library.

On Sunday I made my first attempt at making sourdough bread. Considering the recipe I followed produced a loaf about 2 inches taller, I think it fell flat. I used no commercial yeast in my attempt to make a true sourdough.

Yes, I am a food geek. What’s more, I seem to be enamored with food that requires time, aging and some sort of chemical transformation. Beer, cheese, yogurt, sourdough. Ah, as I type this I realize they all go through fermentation. No wonder I started way back when with making beer.

The recipe said to let it rise three times. I think next time I will try just twice. I did get a pretty good rise the first and second times, but this was made with my very first starter which might not not have enough of the wild yeasties to produce the third rise.

I did tear off a corner and taste it and it’s delicious. Tangy and chewy, far more so than any commercial sourdough I’ve tried.