Fickle Spring

This is what it looked like Monday night as 48 packages of bees, about 3 pounds of bees each with a queen, arrived in Star Valley at 6pm. 

I waited my turn.  I had ordered two packages of bees, each costing $140.  When one considers their journey, this amount really does not seem that bad.  BeeMan Mike was gathering the bees in California last Wednesday.  Over the river and through the woods - as well as up and over a couple of mountain passes!  These bees did some traveling.  

I walked up to the back of the trailer with my old ochre colored blanket and swaddled my bees lovingly, protecting them from the cold as I traversed my way to the back of the car where they remained wrapped and I drove to Freedom. 

Recently, I confessed to a group of wanna-be beekeepers that I obsess more over my bees than my husband or my dogs.  It is true.  We all saw the weather forecast and we all starting planning.  I brought my hives into the garage in Freedom.  Stacked them up with frames of honey and open drawn frames for their new home.  The garage is cool, but warmer than outside.  All entry and exit sites on the hives were covered with screen to prevent escape while allowing for ventilation.  Sugar water was put in place.  I had a plan. 

My friend Beth put her packages in hives inside her greenhouse.  She thought they were contained.  One box had an undiscovered hole and she found a zillion bees flying around inside her greenhouse.  They got out.  They got lost.  They will most likely die.  Bees use the sun to orient themselves to where their home is located.  A greenhouse if very confusing to a bee.  The colony will most likely be okay. 

As I pulled into the garage, I lit the smoker and went to work.  Three pounds of bees is a lot of bees.  I held their white plastic container open and gave a good shake.  The pile of bees plopped atop the boxed queen.  They landed in their new home.  Everything got closed up and they remain there, in the garage.  

This is why.  View out our back door in Hoback last night. 

Six new inches of snow and a low of 9 degrees.  

Retirement creeps closer.  I'm taking a vacation day or two and less than a dozen days are left.  It's a new chapter, a new beginning.  Exciting and terrifying - more the former than the latter!!  

We are thinking of Linda and her broken knee.  Heal well, heal strong.  

 

Many Books

We are pawing through our stuff.  Lately, our books.  Hard cover, soft cover, old and new.  All books are getting examined, thought about, remembered and for the most part, sent off to the recycle center.  

Recently discovered, our recycle center has one of those giant sized heavy duty cardboard boxes to drop your finished softcover book or your finished hardcovered book.  As you prepare to unload your burden, it is impossible to not look at the selection, scattered about below.  With great discipline, one must drop and go, otherwise, the temptation to pick an interesting title could cause the burden of books to return to the dusty empty shelf.  So many books, so little time!  

Here's the remarkable thing!  We have two copies of three titles!  Not a surprise, UNDAUNTED COURAGE , soft cover, long version.  What a great book.  I could see Lewis and Clark make their way west as I gobbled up that book, enchanted.  If you know Mike and I and the book, it will not be hard to believe we own two of this title.  I will be recycling not one, but two copies of this excellent book, hoping someone else will enjoy the treat. 

The next two book titles surprised me!  Although I listened to this wonderful book on Audible, we still have two copies (both Michael's I am sure) of ANGLE OF REPOSE by Wallace Stegner.  Oh how this book pulled at my heart strings.  What a wonderfully written story.  Off to the recycle box where hopefully someone will hesitate just long enough to reach down, pick it and and read this master piece. 

The last book (at least thus far in the cleaning quest) is WAR AND PEACE  Now, I realize this is a classic.  I tried.  I tired really hard to get through its massive tome.  All copies of this book will go to the big box.  And there, I bet, they will remain.  On to their final destiny.  I wonder what that is......

We suffered through a gale force storm two nights ago which ripped down a famous movie screen on the other side of the Tetons.  HERE IS THE NEWS REPORT .  Tragic for so many.  Childhood, teen, and adult memories toppled down by the invisible 2 am Hand of the Wind.  Rumor is, locals will rebuild.  

The storm also brought back winter with three inches of snow and cold temperatures.  My bees cannot be impressed.  I watch one hive in Freedom, the population quickly dwindling.  Bees will break your heart, they will. 

I've been making a sourdough bread with "local" - as local as you get when you are in Jackson - wheat.  This is 80 whole wheat and 20 white from a Wyoming Heritage Grains near the Big Horn Mountains.  This is Mike's favorite of the breads I make.  

And now, back to the bookshelf! 

April & The Topic of Fools

It's spring.  We have a high wind warning for this afternoon and this evening.  Threats of 80mph wind gusts waft about the office and email.  Snow flakes zip by my window.  Blustery is a word that comes to mind. 

Had a great conversation with a fellow beekeeper this morning about how obsessed we bee people are - especially this time of the year.  "Things are buzzing" has many meanings!  We laughed about obsessing more over the health and well-being of our bees over that of our dogs!  Imagine the horror of going out to your beloved bee hives and seeing this!!  This picture taken from a friend's brother in laws apiary near Rochester, NY.  Apparently there are bears there.  What a travesty!  This beekeeper will be staring over.  

Here is a video from my very populated hive in Hoback.  This hive did remarkable this year and already has brood (for you non-bee people, that means eggs and pupa; ie, new bees are coming!).  Sunday afternoon was warm.  The new bees were out making figure 8s in front on the hive.  This is their way of learning where home is located - did you know bees use the sun to figure out where to go? Click on the arrow, it should play. 

I am currently just about finished with a really great book.  This book has made me think about drinking beer (I really don't like the stuff), drink wine, mixed up a rum cocktail, then enjoyed some dark brewed coffee, pondered if a tea bush could grow in Wyoming, and now on what will probably be the last chapter, I contemplate how much I hate sugary cola drinks!  It's been an awesome book.  I give it five stars! 

Meanwhile, we sort.  We sort through all the things two people can acquire in sixty years.  Mike has filing cabinets filled with papers, a plethora of photographs on the wall, and enough ball caps to cap an army.  Literally!  I have a kitchen with just about every gadget imaginable.  An Insta Pot that makes amazing yogurt from a half gallon of milk I got from a friend.  A Cuisanart Food Processor which I am in so much love I cannot imagine a kitchen without it!  My trusty little bread lame, oh how I love you and your carved walnut surface with the very sharp blade! You have help me score scores of loaves of aromatic sourdough loaves.  My current worry is that the new kitchen will not house all the items I currently have crammed into every nook and cranny in the very small kitchen.....it is a serious and sincere concern. 

This is a daunting task.  I would feel very sorry for children having to sort through all of this nonsense when we are gone - if we had them!  

 

I Cook

Creating food is a way to reduce stress.  I've been cooking a lot as I wind down to my last days of work before Retirement.  There is still much to do; office to clean, interviews to conduct, plans to review, and on and on.  I see now, it won't be quite to easy to wrap things up and walk away.  

Mike and I find great joy in entertaining.  Here, the table set for six, snow in the fields and Ruby at the door.  It was a lovely evening.  I stepped out there and took tons of risk making all first-time dishes!  A salad with grilled and pickled octopus, a tomato farro soup, and the main course, paella with squid, shrimp, mussels, and clams finished on the still-shiny Traeger grill.  Dessert, was flan which came out perfectly!  It was a wonderous gathering of friends sharing wine and great food! 

  

Here is the pickled octopus.  It was really very delicious!

The new stone top got installed today.  Now all we need are the appliances.  It will be a great upgrade from the tile surface and old gray grout.  Last I talked to Mike, he had just scratched it!  Well, that had to happen; I guess sooner, than later.  Sigh.

 

Meanwhile, I cook for Slow Foods of the Tetons, making my delivery of sourdough breads, scones, frozen chocolate chip cookie dough, and kraut as the orders come in.  I go home, make dinner, and make food for others.  I do it when I want and make as much as I want and I see the opportunity for income in retirement.  It has been a great opening window!  Here are some food images to leave you with in this long, overdue post!

Last image, a meatloaf worth remembering.  Adding olives made it so delicious!! 

Keeping Bees

 The most difficult part of being a beekeeper are the winters.  Do you know how a bee makes it through the winter?  They cluster very tightly together and shiver, keeping each other warm and warming the inside of the hive.  They need to keep the inside around 70 degrees.  This takes a whole lot of shivering especially on a night like last night. 

VERY COLD MORNING IN JACKSON AREA

Long Time

 Apologies.  It's been a long long time since I have posted.  We are well and very busy.  Soon, something will be posted!

A Good Day to Poop

Many people do not think about (why would one, really?) how bees make it through the winter.  We have had morning after morning after morning of below zero weather.  Bees will form a tight cluster inside the hive, keeping the temperature around 70F.  When it gets warmer during the day and thus so in the hive, some will break away and eat the stores of honey stored on the frames in the hive.  

Today, the temperature has warmed to 20F.  It feels almost balmy out and the bees need to stretch their legs and poop.  Many won't make it back, landing on the snow and cooling down to where they can no longer fly.  There are already hundreds of bees scattered about, apostrophes on the brilliant white snow.  It is alarming for the first year beekeeper and thrilling for the more seasoned beekeeper.  Dead bees mean there are still live bees!  

The birds have figured out bees are tasty treats as well.  The bees that do not come back are less to keep the cluster warm but also less that need to eat.  It's a balancing act, being a bee and making it to spring!  

Happy to see the girls out today!  I have a video, but it refuses to upload.  Ah, here it is!! 

Happy Birthday Addie - this Friday!  Your birthday always is a surprise as one asks, how can it already be February??  And here we are!  You have had one more year of traveling
around the sun!  May your day be filled with love and joy, friends and food and family.  All the things you are and all the things you love.  May your heart sing, may your body celebrate in the strength you have given it, running up hills and around this wild western landscape.  Have a great day, Friend!!  

One Red Cow

She was a terrible mother.  No interest in her baby, the cow calf got skinnier and skinnier until finally Tom at the ranch had to bottle feed the baby for a bit.  It was really a shame.  That big cow was pregnant this fall too. Such a shame she didn't want to be a mother.  The Wyoming sun would shine off that red coat, fire across the hairs backlit on her back.  She was a lovely specimen of a bovine creature, but a terrible mother. 

And that earned her a place in the line at the butcher.  And a line there is!  She got fed good hay and grain and got big and fat before her number came up.  They called to tell us our beef was ready to be picked up on Monday. 

Mike emptied out recycle containers, containers with garden grow cloths, and containers with items for the second hand donation store in preparation to pick up the order.  The racks were tall and full!  At least 36 cubic feet of space was filled with two pound tubes of hamburger wrapped in red and white packages of "Ground Red".  All ground beef recipes are requested!

Tender loin steaks, round steaks, sirloins, cross cut steaks (what the heck is that?), giant briskets, flank steak, skirt steaks, rib steaks, and on and on.  The white, frozen packages got lined up, stacked up, and put in a total of four freezers by the time we finished.  

Mike has stated that I am a food hoarder.  It was a Food Hoarder's Nirvana, the day of putting Red into our various and scattered about freezers.  

Snow-a-geddon

 

Hoback Bee Hive, December 26, 2021

January 6, 2022

It has snowed.  A lot.  Then it rained.  Which is really awful.  

This is our roof this morning.  Some of the roof has already slid.  When it goes, it's a bit alarming.  Sounds like a freight train rumbling down metal tracks overhead.  We saw a big fabric tent that had collapsed under the weight of the wet, soggy snow on our way home last night from Freedom.  Bummer.  Which was, by the way, one of the most white-knuckled, treacherous drives I have made in a long time.  

I stuck the car in the Freedom driveway, the snowmachine twice as I tried to mitigate the banks and drifts and got soaked blowing and shoveling snow.  Michael was none too impressed.  

Today the world is white and soggy.

Climate Change Topics

Last year, two books came into my life.  Dark books.  The first by Cormick McCartry THE ROAD , a story about a man and his boy walking a ruined and frightening planet.  One gets the feeling the destruction was more nuclear than climate change.  The very next book that fell on my lap was THE BEAR by Andrew Krivak which was not quite so dark.  This one, a man and his daughter are walking the planet which the Reader gets the feeling that a pandemic may have been the cause of the end of humanity.  It was well written.  I do not recommend either of these books to anyone who might feel negatively affected by dark and emotionally-charged words.  These may not be great books for the current pandemic-turning-to-endemic climate......

However, it is weird when books land in your lap in a narrow time slot and have similar messages.  Again, this has happened to me recently.  The first book THE INVENTION OF NATURE by Andrea Wulf was one discovered from Ryan Holiday, a guy who makes his living reading books and tell us followers what the books he is reading are all about.  Alexander von Humboldt was an adventurer and the first person to recognize man's impact on changing the climate.  This was pre 1800's and he was most likely the first to give climate change a name.  The next book that came to my lap (well, really my ears as all of my book reading is done through Audible!), was CLOUD CUCKOO LAND by Anthony Doerr.  This one took some work to recollect where the recommendation originated - thank you Mary Austin for bringing me this wonderfully written, delightfully crafted, and enormously entertaining book!  The topic of climate change threads through the many stories told as the author guided us from BC to 2085 time eras.  There was a Siri aboard a ship to answer your every question (her name was Sybil) and a library fashioned just like Google!  The characters become real beings jumping off the pages.  Well read, I strongly recommend this in Audible format, this well-crafted adult story tale. 

Meanwhile, a wicked fire has touched a town east of us and we all watch, horrified.  This article, sent to me by one of our County Commissioners, tells the story of panic, disbelief, and very high winds the residents in the Colorado communities of Louisville and Superior experience.  We are reminded that when there is high wind, fire becomes a Monster.  Wind is a four letter word.  The "lessons" of climate change bang around in my brain after reading these two books and watching the news of this urban landscape conflagration.  

So 2022 begins.  Our paid staff and volunteers are suffering with COVID infections.  Many are out sick and staffing is very very skinny.  Our ability to respond is crippled.  The ambulance is currently driving to a remote location in our county for a woman with COVID symptoms.  I am on duty Saturday and Sunday and have ominous foreboding concerns about what our organization will "look" like by then.  A storm brews to the west with predictions of heavy snow and blowing winds making emergency response even more challenging.  

By nature, I am an optimist and can usually find good in most anything.  Today, I am trying to find some ray of light, some positivity in this daunting world of pandemics and climate change. 

There are 88 working days left until I retire.  Maybe that is today's positive thought. 

Stay well. Stay positive.  We are all in this thing together.   

The picture below is why buying an amaryllis bulb is so rewarding!! 

Gift from The Magi (aka, The Wizard)

I failed miserably at getting anything for Michael this year.  He got himself a new welder - something I am certainly NOT qualified to go out and buy!  But he, in his last minute quest, got me a beautiful Christmas gift and I am delighted!

What could that be, you ask?  What could it be that you want but didn't just go out and buy?  And there is where Mike's wisdom and observations skills turned him into a Magi (a Wise Man bearing a Gift) or as George would note, The Wizard (a nicknamed donned to Michael for reasons I am unsure of, however, a funny and clever name, indeed!).  

You see, Mike knows me very well.  He knows that I would search for years to find an expensive item in a second hand store but I would never go out and buy something so crazy-expensive like a good bread knife.  He also knows we just happen to have one of the crazy-expensive knife stores right here in Jackson Hole New West Knives  This 9" super bread knife is one I have lusted for and Mike knew it.  So, he went right over to the store and got it for me!!  Look how beautiful it is next to a fresh loaf of olive/caper sourdough bread! 

And there is the moral of this story.  It's not about giving but it's about knowing the person you are giving to - knowing them so well and so deeply you understand the exact gift to buy.  At some point, Mike will read this blog and when you do, my Dear One, I hope you know it is my thank you card to you, the one who knows me so well. 

Silent Night

By her bedside all night, they knew death was near.  Janet breathed her last breath of her life Tuesday morning. Heavy sad hearts having to say goodbye.  Her three boys - Mike, Scott, and Steven - gather around, tears falling, hearts breaking.  Their momma is gone.  She lived a long and full life and this they celebrate.  Holding the memories close. 

Life goes on, as it will, as it must.  Mike jumped on the plane and got home just before the airlines started shutting down flights.  It is indeed a Christmas miracle; he has thus far shown no signs of getting the insanely contagious Omicron COVID while away.  I have been worrying and fussing all day about the invitation to a Christmas party tomorrow with 15 or 20 people.  The influx of tourists have made our COVID numbers escalate to numbers beyond what we saw with the Delta variant.  We have made it this far......... 

The snow falls.  Big fat wet flakes splat down, piling up on the beehive, sliding off the metal roof sounding like the deep-throated roar of thunder overhead.  We shovel and plow and shovel some more.  Winter has arrived, indeed. 

I took a walk up and above and around the property today.  No snow shoes, no skis, just my tall Schnee boots which I love so much for this kind of trek.  Uphill through heavy snow made for an excellent jaunt.  Fresh deer tracks in the snow.  Chickadees on the bird feeder.  It is lovely outside. 

Hush

The whisper of someone leaving.  Mike's mom, Janet, has terminated dialysis.  Her sons Mike, Scott, and Steven sit by her bedside providing comfort as they are able and sharing their presence with her as she gets closer to her death.  She is comfortable and they help calm her as she wakes from periodic naps to ask what time it is.  Yesterday, a "comfort" cat was brought into the room and Janet was able to give the furry feline a petting.  How nice.  Janet has enjoyed cats through her life so I know this was very special for her. 

It is hard to let a loved one go.  Holidays do not make the effort any easier.  Heavy hearts as the Trumbower family prepares to lose a loved one.  

“What is lovely never dies, but passes into another loveliness, star-dust or sea-foam, flower or winged air.”
—Thomas Bailey Aldrich

“There are no goodbyes for us. Wherever you are, you will always be in my heart.” 
—Mahatma Gandhi

A Short Story

The woman made the fifteen mile trip back into town to the post office.  Dinner had been served and the night had turned dark.  A deer slipped from the dark and crossed the road successfully.  She parked the car next to the curb, locked the rig, and went inside. 

Tucked amongst rows of post office boxes, she found the recycle bin blue can, removed its lid and began to sift through the pile of catalogs, envelopes pleaing for money, and ripped-up unidentifiable pieces of paper.  Her visit here earlier brought her back to this place.  Standing under bright fluorescent lights, illuminating the gray postal quarters to reveal the bare ugliness of the place, she searched for the envelope mistakenly recycled earlier in the day. 

Catalogs grabbed her attention.  Stylish covers with company names never seen caused a pause in the search.  Some were even opened and paged through.  Sweaters sporting the fancy selling price of $385 for 100% cotton amused her and she went back to the methodical process of sifting through the day's jetsam,  discarded by many mail collectors with the optimistic belief the pages will be put to a better or another use. 

The day had been such a busy day; holiday luncheon, a vehicle that needed washed, phone calls to return, and investigators to provide answers in response to tert and pointed questions.  The stop at the post box was ill-planned in the day's activities as she was already running late.  With the air of  pompousness, she prided herself, once again, at being the sorter of the omnipresent begging missives wrapped in envelopes and found within the two post office boxes she and her husband kept there at the old post office.  His box was filled with these silent paper pleas.  Because he sent them money.  

She quickly went through the pile.  Two letters having the same insignia caught her attention and she decided to keep one and recycle the other.  It seemed like a compromise.  If someone was willing to send two declarations for a donation, she would deliver one home. 

And then she got home.  It was then when it was discovered there was a tag for a year's snowmobile permit within the one envelope.  No, she had not read the letter insignia.  

And that is when she traveled in the dark of the Wyoming winter night to revist the old post office. 

The other envelope was found at the very bottom of the blue recycle bin. 

The End. 

Introducing: Bacon Sourdough Bread

This. Bread. Is. Amazing.  Exclamation Mark!!

It is however, a bit onerous to make.  First one must crisp a half pound of bacon (without eating it all).  A half pound of cooked bacon equals not much more than a half cup of delicious, crunch bacon bits.  There is plenty of bacon fat to add to the recipe. 

Then, you have to make the bread.  Friend Katie says, "Sourdough Bread is Love!"  She knows how much work and time goes into every loaf.  Oh yeah, and love!!  

This loaf came out of the oven this morning with three others and I'm still slobering, mouth-watering crazy-tempted to cut into one when I get home.  The real discipline with making sourdough bread is not eating tons and tons of it (slathered with real butter, of course!). 

See, your mouth is watering too now - just looking at it!!  

The other loveliness of the day revolves around saved geranium plants now gracing the window sill.  Isn't this blossom so pretty?!  

For you meteor-shower lovers, Mike and I have been enjoying a meteor or two or three for the last three mornings as we begin our day in the hot tub.  It's a good reason to get up early!  

Step One, Step Two, Step Three

 Step One.  Find an elk to harvest.  This is not an easy quest.  Our horses and mules worked hard to get us up to the top of this ridge.  When we cut wolf tracks, I was certain the chances of running into elk were nil.  But, we found tracks.  Followed the track.  I got a good shot. 

Step Two.  Hang the butchered elk in a cool spot for a week or two.  This process of keeping meat cool but not frozen helps break the meat down into something more tender.  Like aging a steak (have you seen the price of aged beef???!!).  The hung meat begins to dry, enzymes and bacteria work away causing enhanced flavor and tenderizing.  Then one plops a quarter on one's large work space and begins cutting muscles sections away from the bone and away from each other.  

The first elk I killed, a small calf on the Elk Refuge way back in 1995, was my first attempt at home butchering.  I lived in a tiny A Frame house with no work space at all.  I had no idea what I was doing and as I recall, I made a mess of the thing.  Whatever they wanted to butcher an elk was fine with me, from that day forward. 

Happily, Mike has taken lots of elk I have killed to the butcher over the years.  The price per pound has inched its way up to be a fairly expensive endeavor, even without having to pay for the animal.  Of course, you do realize that is not a free elk pictured above.  The cost of the license, the conservation stamp, the day I took off work, the horses and mules that had to be fed and doctored are all real costs.  When you add all that up, well, that is one expensive elk!  

This year's elk, as seen above, was a one year old cow.  Not a calf, but pretty young.  She was small and I decided, why not?  I think I will butcher this one!  (With retirement less than six months away now, realizing that the pipe doling out bi-weekly pay checks is about to get shut off has made me even more thrifty-minded).  

So, there I was three nights ago, perched over a dry-skinned back quarter of an elk wondering where to begin.  There were YouTubes to watch which sort of helped.  Lacking much of a knife, the sharpening tool was close at hand.  I realized quickly that cutting the muscles from the bone and from each other was pretty cool and interesting and I needed to know what muscle was what.  Was that the round steak?  Which was the sirloin?  The pile of meat from a back quarter was impressive. 

Back quarter number two was tackled on Night Two.  I was pretty sure I found the tri-tip and pulled it for consumption for the following night.  Most chunks of muscle were just labeled as "Back Quarter" or "Front Quarter".  Last night's front quarter was a whole new set of muscles and bones - and not much meat.  

With a monster borrowed meat grinder, plans are to finish up the last front quarter tonight and start grinding.  One thing for sure, there is more meat harvested when one butcher's one's own elk.  There is a whole lot less burger from this elk.  Not much stew meat and many packages of unidentified muscle pieces!  

Here is the tri tip.  Dry marinated with a homemade rub of spices, it sat in the refrigerator during the day.  I did not have high hopes for deliciousness, but what a genuine surprise!!  This first piece cooked of elk meat was amazing.  A real treat, a real reminder of how rewarding it is to be a part of the whole thing - start to finish.  Thank you Miss Elk.  We appreciate the life you gave up so we may feast. There are many more feasts to come.  Pictured below; elk tri tip steak, homemade sourdough Seedie bread, broccoli from the garden, and potatoes from the store!  

Which Do You Pick?

 Chocolate Chip Cookie work of art!  Which is better, cooked or uncooked?  Not many make it to the oven at our house.  Steven, I'm thinking of putting this on the list to sell.  How much do I charge for six frozen chocolate chip cookies? 

What have we been up to....

 Apologies.  Long time since I've posted.  I've been to Sante Fe for a great week of training, home and then back off again to Lander WY for more great training. 

My guide checked the elk regs and my late season elk tag closed way before I guessed.  So, we have had to hustle and do some quick hunting.  Took a Monday off (gasp, I never take Mondays off!) and after a big big climb and some luck (always luck involved in hunting!), my guide got me into a nice herd of elk.  This was a super-fun hunt.  One I will always remember.  I have a very good guide! 

This is a young cow.  Not a calf, but not much more than a year old.  We will butcher her ourselves; great Thanksgiving weekend project.  Thank you Miss Elk.  Your sacrifice of your life is recognized and appreciated.  We are so privileged to hunt in such big beautiful country, to harvest lean organic meat, and to have strong stock to get us there.  A day to always remember.  

Emily's Quest, Series 1

Good Morning Blog Followers!  Meet Emily.  And Carter and Annie.  

One of the cooler things about a family are those who come into the family.  Emily married Mike, my half brother.  Mike and I share the same Dad - who, incidentally, is my Number One blog-reading fan!.  Mike did good!  Look at those smiles and the cutie the two of them made.  There are not many red heads in the Kinzer Family! That's Carter, their Number 1 son!!  And Annie, one heck of a good dog.  

Emily reached out to me recently asking some questions about sourdough bread making.  As I have been up to my elbows lately in flour and sourdough starter, and she is not the only one I know curious about making sour dough breads and things, I will begin a series titled, "Emily's Quest" the adventures of making sourdough bread.  

Bread needs air or it is more like a rock or a tortilla!  Air comes from bacteria eating sugar and producing gas.  Interestingly enough, it is the same bacteria that makes delicious batches of sauerkraut fermenting away on my counter tops that makes sourdough starter bubble away on my counter.  Lactobacillaceae.  The breakdown process produces lactic acid which gives sourdough its unique flavor.  Makers of many good things.  These gas pockets form and if there is a strong structure, they will be nice little pockets of air in your loaf.  Illustrated below, one of my favorite loaves - pecan bread made with some rye flour and molasses. 

Anyone interested in sourdough bread has heard stories of years-old sourdough starter, kept alive and passed from generation to generation.  "My great great grandma's aunt started this starter back in Minooka Illinois"!!  It is speculated that the whole thing came about when someone waaaaay back when left out some mixed bread dough and wild yeasts settled in making for a lighter and more airy bread.  One article I researched boldly stated, "sourdough bread is older than metal".  Wow, that's old. 

Some say you can taste the differences in various starters due to the various wild yeast types.  San Francisco, known for its sourdough bread, discovered a local yeast, named it and then found it in a number of other places!  This is a fun article to read  Wild Yeast and proclaims the most probable real truth - the flavors are generated more from the flours and sweeteners than from the yeast variety.  This article is a bit misleading, touting the benefit of these good bacteria.  Truth is, they all die when one bakes the bread.  They may have done some really good health things while rising and working, however, the health benefit of live bacteria can only be found in fermented products that have not seen heat; sauerkraut, yogurt, and kombucha, for example. 

So where does one start on this quest to make sourdough bread?  Emily is making some of her own, putting a caldron of wheat and water on her counter, inviting wild yeast to settle in and call her starter home.  I love everything from King Arthur and this is where I would go if I didn't already have starter of my own.  I have been gifted two different starters; one from a gal with whom I used to exercise and another from Addie, my all-creative blog-follower master-baker friend.  One lost its zeal and I know feed Addie's starter regularly keeping it alive with constant flour and water refreshings.  They say starter can be dried, the bacteria chilling out in the dried crispy flour flakes.  I have sent some Wyoming wild yeast for Emily to reconstitute and see if the yeast will come to life. 

Series 2 will discuss the process of making the bread.  Get out your kitchen scale (thanks for that tip Addie, you are spot-on right!), bowls and mixing spoons!  Below, some happy sourdough starter pictures.