What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

Well, after being down with a bad headache all day yesterday, I felt much better today and made up for lost time. I even had to keep my two youngest grandsons from 3:45 yesterday afternoon until their parents and older brother got home from his track meet last night. I’m usually a pretty fun grandma,… Continue reading Whirlwind Wednesday

It’s so nice knowing most anything we buy in the store can be made at home, especially those things that take few ingredients and are super easy. One of the best things about sourdough are all the “discard” recipes. Yesterday morning I fed my starter because I was going to start sourdough sandwich bread last...

I have never had great success making bread. Except for quick breads, like pumpkin, banana, etc. I tried making a whole wheat sourdough yesterday from some starter gifted to me by a fellow quilt guild member, and it’s the best bread turnout I’ve ever had. Not that I have tried very much. I was always… Continue reading Bread and Headed to the Ranch

No, not a quilt finish but a finish nonetheless. I believe that I started this one the summer before last but it's done, in a frame and ready for its close up! I had to laugh when I read Mary's Country Threads blog the other day and she referred to quilters who've taken up cross stitch as "jumping ship"! I haven't gone all in, as in totally overboard, but I do stitch to unwind in the

No, not a quilt finish but a finish nonetheless. I believe that I started this one the summer before last but it's done, in a frame and ready for its close up! I had to laugh when I read Mary's Country Threads blog the other day and she referred to quilters who've taken up cross stitch as "jumping ship"! I haven't gone all in, as in totally overboard, but I do stitch to unwind in the

What's new, besides the year?! I've been busy with new things, breadmaking for one. Loaves abound! As I posted before, I am baking rustic, sourdough loaves from a wild starter on a weekly basis now. Mr. G. was eager to resurrect another sourdough starter, similar to one that I had used back when our children were small. It is fed with sugar and instant mashed potato flakes and produces sweeter,

What's new, besides the year?! I've been busy with new things, breadmaking for one. Loaves abound! As I posted before, I am baking rustic, sourdough loaves from a wild starter on a weekly basis now. Mr. G. was eager to resurrect another sourdough starter, similar to one that I had used back when our children were small. It is fed with sugar and instant mashed potato flakes and produces sweeter,

When it comes to bread-baking, nothing compares to a freshly-baked, crusty sourdough mini loaf. Sourdough breads are incredibly simple to make with the help of just a few key ingredients. Let’s get started and discuss the basics of making a sourdough mini loaf that will become a favorite in your home.

1. This recipe is perfect for experimenting with new flours on a smaller scale.

A sourdough mini loaf is the perfect recipe for experimenting with new flours. If you’re like me and like to play around with fresh milled flour blends then I think you’ll love ...

Baking your own sourdough bread can be a fulfilling and delicious experience. On and off for over a decade, I have been making sourdough bread. I recently decided to start milling my own flour. This is a new experience for me and I am excited to share the journey and insights I have gained in the process. With the help of some organic hard white wheat berries, a healthy homemade sourdough starter, and a few simple steps, I have been able to produce artisanal, homemade sourdough bread with unique flavors and textures. I have made almost a dozen loaves of ...

Baking with wild yeast has been a tradition for centuries, and it is a great way to make delicious, artisan-style breads. Sourdough starters created with wild yeast are particularly special, as the living organisms in the starter create a unique flavor and texture. Making a sourdough starter with wild yeast requires patience and knowledge, but the results are worth it. In this blog post, we will discuss the process and tips for starting a wild yeast sourdough starter, so you can make your own artisan breads at home. With some practice and attention to ...

When we gathered together to celebrate my FIL's 85th birthday, our Oklahoma tribe arrived at the ranch a few days early:                                    And I have to show off this beautiful, handmade rolling pin our girl gifted me - it's a piece of art, but rest assured, I'm using it!Our girl has access to an endless supply of sand cherries, grapes, and blackberries and she has jumped on

A friend texted me Friday night to see if I wanted to come over for a BBQ yesterday. I did, but I’d already promised to bake my mom bread. I decided if I got up at 3am and took the dough out for the remainder of it’s proof, I could get it baked by seven, and have time to bake chocolate chip pecan cookies and make a crunchy bacon pea salad.

I went back to bed and slept until five thirty, so that worked out beautifully!

The girls loved the pea salad, so here’s the recipe. I ...

Thank heavens I got the pizza’s baked last night, I sure won’t have the energy tonight. And a 72 hour ferment? Absolute perfection. I don’t think I can go back to an overnight ferment. Everything from taste to texture is much better with the longer fermentation, and shaping/stretching is much easier as well.

I think these crust shots speak for themselves. This is the last dough formula I posted, and I love it. The dough is mixed and worked with stretch and folds over the course of the day, then refrigerated until ready to use. It ...

I felt mostly good yesterday, and back to a hundred percent this morning. I’ll be getting my walk in again after three days of skipping it. Jim had the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and had no side effects at all from it. Yay!

I did manage to finish getting all the threads buried in the churn dash quilt yesterday at least, although I probably missed a few and will have to bury them as I find them if so.

I’d planned to work on the binding, but Siri cat had other ideas. It’s about halfway done. Of course ...

I know I’m weird, and my idea of the perfect day rarely resembles the average person’s ideal. Five o’clock in the morning found me in the kitchen mixing up a batch of red peppers and tomatoes to oven roast. I absolutely adore these, and always have a batch in the fridge.

While the peppers were roasting, I cooked up a package of bacon, something else I like to keep in the fridge. It smelled absolutely amazing!

I fed my sourdough as well, so I could make dough later on in the day. I typically cook bacon in ...

The Rugbrød turned out well enough. I don’t think it’s my favorite of that type recipe that I’ve tried, but it’s still delicious. This bread isn’t for everyone and my fond attachment to it is partly nostalgic, partly for health, and I do of course, quite enjoy the taste and texture of it.

The nostalgia comes from my years in Germany, where this was a favorite breakfast of mine, typically eaten with braunschweiger and a bit of sliced red onion, or spread with butter and lemon curd. Yesterday I had it for both lunch and ...

It dropped down to freezing for the last two nights here, so I lugged my four pots of tomatoes and several pots of herbs into the shed overnight… and left them during the day because they’re just too heavy for me to move around much. That should be the last of the freezing weather, hopefully!

I put them back out this morning with the cages back on. I am going to take a walk at the lake today as it’s going to be nice and I haven’t been able to walk at all this month. Afterward, I ...

I tried a new recipe a couple of days ago. While I have a freaking library of bread baking books, and quite a few of them are sourdough, my hands down favorite is Emilie Raffa’s “Artisan Sourdough Made Simple“. I’ve yet to try a recipe out of it that isn’t spot on perfect. She has amazing sense for blending flavors.

I used half castelvetrano green olives (my favorites!) and half greek black olives. Four o’clock in the morning had me outside in my beds with a flashlight hunting down enough fresh thyme for the dough, the ...

Saturday, in my funk, I decided making pizza on Sunday would help move my mind to a better place. I decided to up my dough hydration to 75%, but everything else being the same. Same method, mixed the night before with 4-5 stretch and folds before a bulk ferment overnight on the counter, dough split into two balls in the morning, and refrigerated until two hours before I was ready to bake. The first hour is to let the dough come to room temperature, and the second is for stretching the dough.

50g 100% rye hydration starter
15g olive oil ...

More or less. Jim let me know Saturday he was going to make it home for my birthday on Monday. He drove through the night Sunday (twelve hours from Georgia!) and made it in by 8 am. It was a very short visit as he had to leave at dawn again this morning, but I was so happy to see him!

Cosmo got a much needed bath! They both had fun, it was a beautiful eighty degrees out and I enjoyed watching them play from the comfort of my camp chair read more