Rise Up!

I'd love to have some insightful verbiage concerning standing up for oneself or speaking out against injustice here, but I'm talking about YEAST. Let it rise!

I think I'm over my fear of baking with yeast.

There's something about not having had a paycheck for three months that makes a chick go into Frugal Mode. This includes baking my own bread.

I have a bread machine that puts out some pretty good loaves of bread, but all summer long, I've been mulling over getting down and dirty in the kitchen again and creating bread with my two plump hands. I'm a good cook and a passable baker. However, last year is sort of a blur with the exception of the knowledge that my family ate out WAY TOO MUCH because I was always so exhausted and spent after working. A great deal of that is related to the health issues I had. Now that I'm finally feeling more like myself again, my ass is cooking.

I found what appeared to be a simple recipe for dough - for use in making foccacia. I'm a bread whore through and through. If I had to go with two foods for the rest of my life they would be good bread and better cheese. You know I don't hold back so I'll soothe your first thought after reading "cheese" and let you know that for whatever reason, I never have a problem with constipation after eating copious amounts of cheese. It's all good in my intestines. (You always get a little more than you bargained for when ya come here!)

I made the foccacia the other night to rave reviews from both Butter and my Pack Mule.

It's around 95 degrees here today and humid. And nasty. And gross. Even Butter doesn't want to venture outside. Heat like this incites riot with his asthma. So. We baked. Take a gander. If anyone wants to come visit, we're here for the duration and will cook until your eyes turn blue and you begin wondering if stretchy pants aren't such a bad fashion invention after all.

Butter was ready to go!

See how proud he is in his red apron? I had to jimmy-rig it so that he wasn't dragging it on the ground. This baby came from an Italian cooking school my Mom attended a few years ago.

We proofed the yeast. See? Is that bowl of puffy, bubbly goodness beautiful or what?

Butter was so excited to be able to mix the flour and yeast mixture once I made certain that I wouldn't have flour all over the place. See that backgound? Yeah. My Pack Mule installed the tumbled marble backsplash as well as the stamped copper stuff behind the stove. I shall keep him around for a while.
Butter helped me knead the dough. He is a PRO.


Ready to rise. Glistening with oil. In one of my very favorite stainless steel bowls.

Ahhh. Yes. Come to mama. This is the first foccacia we made the other night. Sea salt, dried herbs, freshly-grated Parmesan, and lovely olive oil.


Today's foccacia was spartan - sea salt, dried oregano and basil, and a teensy bit of butter on top of the bread after I pulled it from the oven.

This was covered with provolone and dried herbs.

Happiness

Can be translated into different languages and experiences.

Butter obviously makes me happier than words can express. I wasn't "supposed" to be a mother. I'd been told I wouldn't be able to bear children and had given up on the thought. After the initial happiness and shock of finding I was pregnant with him, I had an ultrasound that showed all of his intestines, stomach, and liver on the OUTSIDE of his body. The picture looked like spaghetti. I was told the follow-up ultrasound would likely show the same picture and that I'd seriously have to consider terminating because if he made it full-term, he would likely die during or soon after childbirth or would live maybe a few years in an almost vegetative state, requiring feeding through a tube and almost certain brain abnormalities.

I lived for weeks between that film and the follow-up praying harder than I ever had in my life. None of the doctors who dealt with my case thought that anything would change. Not one of them. These were widely-known doctors who dealt with high-risk pregnancies. I'd prepared myself the best I could for the next appointment.

And the picture showed a closed belly. Nothing hanging out. Nothing stringing along inside the little sac. A closed, round belly. Nothing wrong with the spinal cord. Nothing. Everything was tightly shut.

And the little (whatever. he is SO NOT) four year old I have today - in all of his happy glory - with giraffe rain boots that he doesn't like to wear in the rain because "they might get WET!"