ooops i'm back + sourdough

I really did mean to keep writing in this after I got my job. It's just that I got busy! Weird how that happens.

Today is the end of 2009. This was a rough decade, so I'm playing it out by making sourdough bread, to exorcise the sourness out of my memory of the Naughties. A former coworker of mine gave me a 90 year old starter earlier this year. Her grandmother started it when she was nine, and I think that just about works out to... somewhere around 1920. After grandma died, my coworker's family kept feeding the starter, dividing it, passing it out to friends, to keep her grandma's memory alive in bread form. Here's my favorite recipe for sour dough french bread. I'm not a great big fan of the actual *taste* of sour dough, but I like the idea of it's being a living thing, so this is a good one for me. Low on the starter content.

First off, get the starter out of the fridge the night before and stir it until it's smooth. Let it sit on the counter over night. In the morning,

Mix together:

1 pkg yeast

1/4 C warm water

Mix dry ingredients:

4 C flour

2 T sugar

2 t salt

Add wet ingredients:

yeast you started already

1 C water

1/2 C milk

2 T oil

1/4 C sour dough starter

Knead until smooth. I like to knead regular breads by hand, but this recipe works well with the kneading arms on my mixer. As it's kneading, add in another cup of flour, 1/4 cup at a time. This should get you to that nice "smooth and elastic" consistency after 8 minutes or so. Set it in a warm place to rise until doubled in size, like 45 minutes, depending on how fresh your yeast was.

Punch it down and split it into 2 halves. Form each half into something remotely loaf shaped, and put in greased loaf pans to rise again. If you want to get fancy, make a few diagonal slash marks with a really sharp knife after they have risen, and brush with water to get that nice frenchy crust.

Bake at 400 for 25 minutes.

Today I'm getting creative. My little sis gave me a clay bread pan for Christmas. I've been liking the idea of trying out some clay baking (it's the most ancient baking method, you know), so this is a great time to see if it really makes a difference. I'll be putting one of my loaves in a clay pan, and one in a Pyrex pan. Can't wait to eat it!!!

last one from the summit

I gotta say, the way Blogger rasterizes photos for web is terrible. These are all much more awesome than they look. The color is horrible too.

Anyway, here's the whole lot of us on the summit.

And looking back, what we had to scramble up to get to the top! You can see the tiny people along the route.

We all had a really great time climbing this mountain. For Bill and I, it was our second time, but only our first with a view. Last year was cloudy. The rest of our crew were first timers. I was proud of my parents keeping up like they did too! They really handled it. We had so much fun that we are already considering which mountain to do next year. Perhaps Adams? It looks pretty smooth, just very big and long. We will see!

St. Helens climb summit

Finally, here are the summit photos! The first one below is of the lava dome, growing in the center of the blasted out volcano. Someday this will be a new summit. It's been 29 years since the mountain last erupted, and the dome is getting pretty large. You can also see Spirit Lake in the background. My dad says this used to be a beautiful, pristine lake at which he and his family used to pick huckleberries. It's now not only in a new location, slightly to the east, but is half-filled with logs left over from the blast.

The West wall of the volcano. You can see some of the striations, as this was a composite cone.

Kind of a dramatic look at the steepness of the drop into the caldera, looking east. Mt. Adams in the distance.

Bill on top. He got here first, of course.

Looking north toward Mt. Rainier.

more!

My cute boyfriend Bill 3/4 of the way up

Jeff, not looking too enthused about what is ahead of him. A bit piqued I'd say.

St. Helens climb Part Deux

Here's a few more photos from our hike up St. Helens. These are from the top section, in scree. Or is it skree? I don't know. Anyway, after going through the boulders I posted pics of yesterday, we got to the loose ash section of the mountain. The climb is up the south side (the side which didn't explode). This side has been relatively untouched by recent volcanic activity, although the ash did seem pretty deep toward the top. It was a long hard slog up the final part of the ascent.

This next one is a terrible picture, but it's part of our group (Mom, Milli, Bill) getting ready to start the final climb.

Apparently, this past year people have been leaving rocks on top of this other rock. This wasn't here last year.

More to come, of the summit!

St. Helens climb

Here's a few pictures from the start of our climb on St. Helens this past Friday. I climbed with Bill, my parents, and friends Milli and Jeff. We made it to the top in about 4 hours. It was a tough climb, but felt really good! These pics are from the very beginning of the hike. I'll post more later.

frustration/happiness

Things around this country seem really bleak right now. The other day, I was catching up on the news while riding the bus. There were just so many depressing stories out there. I don't understand why we are incapable of having a rational discussion in this country about anything. All you see on the news is scandal and screaming. I don't even actually know what's in this health care bill (is there one even?), but I know people enjoy acting like a mob over it! I have no idea what the Republican alternative is (or if there is one), because it's not covered on TV. How am I supposed to make up my mind if I like it or not without being informed? Isn't that the job of the media? The loss of public airwaves has striped networks of their responsibility to truly inform and act as the 4th estate. As a person who has been denied health coverage in the past, I think reform is definitely needed. I just don't know if the things being proposed will work.

So then I read about this crazy thing that happened in Florida last week. A woman was gang raped in the secure parking garage of her hotel in front of her children. The hotel immediately issued a statement saying it took no responsibility because the woman didn't do what was necessary to keep herself safe! Excuse me? You can say you don't take responsibility because the hotel had nothing to do with the act, but you don't blame the victim! It's just terrible!

So after a few stories like this I decided to turn off my phone. The next stop I come to, 2 little families get on, a Latino woman and her son, and a black man and his son. Both kids were about 3 or 4, and neither spoke the other's language. They had apparently befriended each other at the bus stop over a shared love for Thomas the Tank Engine. These 2 adorable boys spent the rest of the bus ride playing together and blabbering on to each other in differing languages, seemingly having the times of their lives. Seeing this made me happy. I think kids can teach us somethings that we forget. Perhaps we could all benefit from being more child-like, and less immature. Anyway, it's trite, but true. Kids are sweet, as long as they belong to someone else. :)