yeasty effervescence

My sister brought back a package of French yeast for me, Alsa brand "levure du boulanger Briochin." It is "pour pains et brioches," and in the little box were five "sachets" which I had used down to the last packet.
A couple of weeks ago, I made a quick batch of pizza dough, turning most of the remainder into a small boule of half whole wheat bread. However, that yeast was just too ebullient, too good to give up that easily, so I saved a tad of the mother from the pizza dough, adding some flour, water and less than half a teaspoon of sugar, and grabbing an Atlas quart canning jar and metal lid that had gone through the dishwasher for this new sourdough experiment.
I already have two batches of sourdough in the refrigerator that I nurture weekly. One is sourdough for bread; the other is buckwheat sourdough for pancakes. Both are in apothecary-type jars that originally held Sasquatch coffee.
Life zigged, then zagged, and the new jar went untouched for about two weeks --- until today. I was making banana sourdough pancakes and saw the jar in the back of the refrigerator. I thought I could add some to the pancake batter and replace some flour and water to keep it going. That was not a problem, however. It was still very much alive.
My first clue was the stubbornness of the lid, which refused to yield. The second clue was a major bulge in the metal of the lid. It was literally a time bomb. The jar had inexplicably failed to implant glass shards and molten yeastiness in the walls of the refrigerator and cartons of milk and eggs therein, due to the sturdiness of that Atlas jar and the Classico pasta sauce metal lid.
I grabbed a large chef's knife with a pointy tip and stabbed a tiny nick into the lid to relieve the pressure.
It was a Silly String Vesuvius, spouting a continuous strand of sourdough accompanied by a hissing sound. When I turned the jar upside down to place the lava flow more directly into the bowl, it spat and sprayed a fine liquid mist onto the knife block, French press, salt shaker and everything else in its line of fire, then resumed the Silly String.
I asked for a little intervention from Mom, as there was no stepping away from this active volcano. She rinsed out a smaller blue apothecary jar that had been languishing on the back counter, and I redirected the pressurized flow into it, while spooning foam from the bowl.
Finally, the stream subsided enough to pry off the lid. I spooned the rest of the sourdough into the new receptacle, after placing whipped cream dollops of the stuff (it was light as air) into my big earthenware bread bowl.
I added unbleached, whole wheat and spelt and gluten flours to the bowl with some water, salt and a teaspoon of honey, beating it with a wooden spoon and making a thick batter before covering it with a towel and heading to town for lunch at Sweet Tomatoes and a four-hour shopping trip.
It was already 6 p.m. by the time we returned home, and the dough had risen into an extremely light sponge. I added more flour, mostly whole wheat and spelt, then kneaded it until it drew away from the walls of the bowl. The oven was at 450, with a shallow pan of water on the bottom shelf. Forming a rough ball, I plunked it onto the pizza stone, which I had lightly oiled and dusted with cornmeal. Slitting the top of the ball, I sprinkled it with water, sesame and poppy seeds. It rose about 10 or 15 minutes while I made dinner, combining Sunday's leftovers in a casserole dish to pop into the oven with the bread.
Those leftovers were two remaining pieces of elk backstrap that I had baked/broiled, a quick Swiss steak for Sunday dinner accompanied by a rice/tomato/corn casserole seasoned with sweet red pepper, cumin, basil, oregano, garlic, etc. The meat and rice/corn casserole were combined on a whole grain tortilla with shredded cheese, garnished with salsa and sour cream.
In the second act, the meat was chopped up with the leftovers in a casserole dish and topped with a little shredded cheese, then popped into the oven with the bread, with the temperature lowered to around 400.
I sauteed two small sliced zucchinis in a shallow non-stick skillet with a little garlic, basil adding a last-minute dribble or two of chicken broth, and covering the pan for a minute or two as the leftovers were reassembled in tortillas.
Dessert was a cluster of grapes and a sliver of the bread cut from the still-warm loaf using a serrated knife. The three-inch long slice was nearly all crust.
Usually when baking bread with sourdough, I add some supplemental yeast. I didn't think it was needed this time, and I was right.
Now if I can just keep this batch going without coating the walls of the refrigerator...

Rising to the occasion...

This week my calendar rolls over to 61. That's an achievement of sorts --- I have survived this long, in spite of myself.
I have been tempted to do something dramatic. I may cut my hair. It's now almost totally white and it's down to my waist. I have been wearing it in a hair appliance-enclosed bun for work much of the time, or in a pony tail. Now that summer is (maybe) arriving, it would be less of an encumbrance short. Sometimes when I look in the mirror, I see a school marm, a librarian or a nun. William once told me he had a dream that I became a nun. It's almost come true.
At a company Christmas party for employees of the tiny newspaper chain we belong to, I blurted out "news nun" as a description, something that just came to me instantly, but it fits.
I am determined I will not spend my pre-retirement years mired in a rut, especially difficult when living with an aging mother.
One small, swift jolt out of the rut: I will be going to Alaska for a week at the end of July. I already have my plane ticket and have paid for the bus ride to the end of the road in Denali. I hope to get some wildlife and scenery pictures to add to my Alaska DVD.
My sister will be coming on the bus trip. We will stay the two nights somewhere at the entrance to the park, then drive back to her home in Eagle River. I may try to drive down the Kenai for a couple of days while I am there. Perhaps I'll stop by and see Glenn at his restaurant, who liked the couple of recipes I gave him and said he will use them. I worked a season at the end of the road in Denali, at the Kantishna Roadhouse as the baker.

Here is my recipe for Kantishna Sourdough Bread:
This recipe is huge --- I used a floor Hobart and it made 8 large French-style loaves. A good starter is needed. I originally used “Gold Rush” brand, which supposedly dated from that era and was available in yellow packets in Anchorage. However, any good sourdough starter will work. Some are slower than others. I have made this bread without adding supplemental yeast --- it just takes longer to rise, at least 4-5 hours as opposed to 1-1/2 hours or so, depending on the temperature, etc.
I fed my starter every time I baked. It needs to be fed at least once a week; I used my starter every night and it didn't seem to suffer. Double the volume by adding flour, water and a teaspoon or so of sugar for a quart or so of starter (I kept mine in the walk-in in a large heavy earthenware bread bowl covered with plastic wrap, admittedly messy but it worked.) It needs to be the consistency of heavy pancake batter. Put half the replenished starter back in the refrigerator after letting it sit out until it bubbles.
I used a floor Hobart for this, but any large, sturdy machine with a dough hook will work. You can quarter the recipe and do it by hand in a large ceramic bowl, which is what I do now, except I don't measure.

In a large mixer with dough hook, add 6 cups lukewarm water (between 95-105 degrees) to 4 cups of starter, 4 tsp. yeast, 6 cups unbleached bread flour (or add 5 cups regular unbleached flour plus 1 cup gluten flour), 8 tsp. sugar and 8 tsp. salt. Beat together until smooth. Let rest a minute, then add 6 more cups of flour (I used 4 cups unbleached and 2 cups of a special very light rye flour for a French feel and taste) while beating vigorously on high with the dough hook until you see the gluten developing. Add about 4 more cups of flour to form a dough that starts to pull away from the edge of the mixer as the dough hook works. This could take five minutes or more. Let rise 60 to 90 minutes until spongy, then gradually add up to 4 more cups flour until you have stiffer dough that forms a good ball that pulls away from the sides on every stroke and starts climbing up the hook. Grease a large stainless steel bowl (only thing big enough), or a nice ceramic bowl if it's a smaller batch, and turn the dough into it. Let it rise covered with a flour sack kitchen towel for 45 minute to an hour. Turn it onto a lightly floured board and knead. Make a rectangle of dough. Let it rest. Using a dough knife/ulu, cut into lengths and form into loaves. Spray long sheet pans or trench bread pans and sprinkle with coarse yellow corn meal, then place the dough lengths on the pans with room to rise, handling gently. Brush lightly with water and make slits at regular intervals on top of the loaves (I use scissors but a very sharp serrated knife or a single-edge razor blade also work.) Let rise until almost double. Bake in a preheated oven at 425 - 450 degrees Fahrenheit on a rack above a large shallow pan of water in the bottom of the oven. Or use a clean spray bottle filled with water and periodically spray inside the oven. (Don't do this in an oven with an exposed glass light bulb. Yes, I learned the hard way.) When the loaves are nicely browned and sound hollow when tapped, they're done. Cool on racks.

Variations: Before baking, sprinkle with sesame or poppy seeds after brushing with water.

You can substitute 8 cups of whole wheat flour for part of the flour; add one-half cup honey.
For rye bread, use half dark rye flour plus one cup gluten flour if it’s not a high protein unbleached bread flour, and add 1 cup dark unsulphured molasses and 1/2 cup caraway seeds. Bake a little longer in a little slower oven for rye or whole wheat.