Oh, Penelope, I can tell already your essays here will call for long savoring and more than one re-read. “Strong like bread”—what a thought to hold. It calls to mind echoes of Ursula K. Le Guin’s lines about love: that it does not sit certain and still as stone, but needs to be made new again and again like bread. If it’s all right with you, I will be printing this one to tuck into the back of our kitchen binder!
Thank you Jan for such thoughtful engagement and commentary. I can tell you read with a patient sincerity and that you treat your own thinking and writing this way too. This essay took a while for me to bring forth and I think one day it could definitely do with revision, because there are a few levels to it conceptually and I think their relationship with one another is still partially submerged in my subconscious! I was proud, though, of what I did manage to make explicit. It genuinely means a lot to me that it resonated with you, too. (And of course, go ahead and print it, what an honour!)
Revisions could be an endless process, and always seem to come best after a few more years of living into a concept! Or so I've found to be true. (It might make you smile to know that my brother happened to be reading over my shoulder as I scrolled back through the piece, and he very enthusiastically inquired if I was going to learn to make my sourdough just like yours.)
Oh that does make me smile! All the more so because my recent loaves have been far less photogenic :') At the moment I care more about replenishing our bread stores as quickly as possible than achieving the perfect crumb! But I do love that the wild vulnerability of the process keeps me humble.
Penelope, have you looked into grinding your own wheat for bread? My kids *love* bread, and my sd starter is currently languishing in the back of the fridge. I’ve been reading about it. I still plan to keep making sourdough I think but my interest has really been piqued with regard to this whole berry/fresh flour thing!
Beautiful piece — I confess I didn’t get to read it all (caretaking calls) but this is great and important thinking❤️
Yes grinding whole wheat berries has been on my radar, but I'm not quite there yet! This is why I love sourdough, I really feel it's a lifetime commitment with so much scope for refinement and experimentation. It's amazing how a single product (bread in this case) can have so much depth nested within its production, when we chose to involve ourselves in producing it (and producing it properly!).
Thank you for reading and no worries, it is a long one, I'm grateful for what you've managed to read. :)
Oh, Penelope, I can tell already your essays here will call for long savoring and more than one re-read. “Strong like bread”—what a thought to hold. It calls to mind echoes of Ursula K. Le Guin’s lines about love: that it does not sit certain and still as stone, but needs to be made new again and again like bread. If it’s all right with you, I will be printing this one to tuck into the back of our kitchen binder!
Thank you Jan for such thoughtful engagement and commentary. I can tell you read with a patient sincerity and that you treat your own thinking and writing this way too. This essay took a while for me to bring forth and I think one day it could definitely do with revision, because there are a few levels to it conceptually and I think their relationship with one another is still partially submerged in my subconscious! I was proud, though, of what I did manage to make explicit. It genuinely means a lot to me that it resonated with you, too. (And of course, go ahead and print it, what an honour!)
Revisions could be an endless process, and always seem to come best after a few more years of living into a concept! Or so I've found to be true. (It might make you smile to know that my brother happened to be reading over my shoulder as I scrolled back through the piece, and he very enthusiastically inquired if I was going to learn to make my sourdough just like yours.)
Oh that does make me smile! All the more so because my recent loaves have been far less photogenic :') At the moment I care more about replenishing our bread stores as quickly as possible than achieving the perfect crumb! But I do love that the wild vulnerability of the process keeps me humble.
Penelope, have you looked into grinding your own wheat for bread? My kids *love* bread, and my sd starter is currently languishing in the back of the fridge. I’ve been reading about it. I still plan to keep making sourdough I think but my interest has really been piqued with regard to this whole berry/fresh flour thing!
Beautiful piece — I confess I didn’t get to read it all (caretaking calls) but this is great and important thinking❤️
Hi Amber, thank you so much for your comment.
Yes grinding whole wheat berries has been on my radar, but I'm not quite there yet! This is why I love sourdough, I really feel it's a lifetime commitment with so much scope for refinement and experimentation. It's amazing how a single product (bread in this case) can have so much depth nested within its production, when we chose to involve ourselves in producing it (and producing it properly!).
Thank you for reading and no worries, it is a long one, I'm grateful for what you've managed to read. :)