This pair of handcrafted earrings features .999 Fine Silver in a pair of 8mm (3/8 inch) hand formed and textured square-on-point charms suspended from Sterling Silver half-ball post studs.
EA1057
Monday, August 31, 2009
.999 Pure Fine Silver Charm, Sterling Post Earrings
EA1057
Sunday, August 30, 2009
.999 Fine Silver Celtic Swirl Circle Pendant
This one-of-a-kind pendant just over a gram of .999 pure Fine Silver circle with Celtic-style swirls. Meauring 15 to 17mm (3/4 inch), this pendant features Celtic Swirl textures on the face of a circle It comes with a generous 5mm (1/4 inch) Sterling Silver jump ring so you can easily slip it onto your own chain or a satin, velvet, or leather cord to wear as a necklace.
Lovingly handcrafted in the
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Eight Susquehanna
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EIGHT SUSQUEHANNA
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Saturday, August 1, 2009
August 2009
VOLUME 1 ISSUE 24
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IN THIS ISSUE
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1. CATEGORIES
2. EARRINGS BUTTERFLY AQUA AB
3. BRACELET COIL PEACOCK PEARLS
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Categories
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.999 Fine Silver [
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Bracelets [
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Butterflies [
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Charms [
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Combs [
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Earrings [
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Gemstone [
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Glasses Leashes [
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ID Lanyards [
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Jewelry Findings [
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Necklaces [
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Notecards [
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Other [
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Pendants [
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Supplies [
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Watches [
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Earrings Butterfly Aqua AB
http://www.salesinaclick.com/eletra/go.cfm?z=osn-617598790%2C377730%2Cbfjlk9Fy%2C3458669%2Cbg0dtl5
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[
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{session.output_mode}}&x=bg0dtl5,bfjlk9Fy ] Aqua
Czech glass butterflies with Aurora Borealis finish on
silver-plated earwires
Price: $6.99
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Bracelet Coil Peacock Pearls
http://www.salesinaclick.com/eletra/go.cfm?z=osn-617598790%2C377730%2Cbfjlk9Fy%2C3458670%2Cbg0dtl5
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[
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{session.output_mode}}&x=bg0dtl5,bfjlk9Fy ]
Three-Coil Memory Wire Bracelet with Peacock Freshwater Pearls
BRC962
Price: $12.00
Buy Now [
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_________________________________________________________________
Published by Eight Susquehanna (mailto:newsletter@eightsusquehanna.com)
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Thursday, June 25, 2009
Eight Susquehanna
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Sunday, April 26, 2009
Progress Report
We went out to the acreage in Mustang to evaluate the interior of the house and see what needs to be done there before we actually move in, and I have to say that while we knew it would be a big job, it looks to be a bigger job than I thought it would be. Fortunately I am married to Superman (sorry for blowing your cover, Dear), so we have accomplished an amazing amount of work this week. That is a good thing, because there is yet a good ten times that much more to be done!I said in my last post that I would post pictures, and the picture I am posting with this entry is of the garden. This is in the same location we had the garden before, so even with seven years of overgrowth, it was relatively easy to till.
Okay, I know, it doesn't look like much right now, but wait 'til some of those plants fill out a little bit! I'll post follow-up photos to prove it later on.
Meanwhile, I'm working in the background to keep my Internet businesses EightSusquehanna.com and my eBay Store going until we can get the new studio set up and get me back to work making more lovingly handcrafted jewelry, so stay tuned, kids!
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Temporary Digs
We have arrived to Oklahoma.
The house on our acreage in Mustang will be available the week of April 20, so we're trying to keep our hands and minds busy until then.
We have taken temporary lodging in a place called Candlewood Suites, a residential hotel. We expect to be here from one to three months while we whip the A-frame into shape.
We've been out there a few times to look around and I am happy to report that:
* The chicken house is intact and will only require some cleaning up and a little repair.
* Apparently no one ever harvested the garlic we planted the October before we moved to Cooperstown and it has naturalized, so with no effort on our part, we will get to harvest garlic this summer!
A LOT of work will be required to bring the rest of the place up to snuff. We'll know more once we can get inside and see what needs to be done there. I'll take pictures next time we go out there and post one or two.
The house on our acreage in Mustang will be available the week of April 20, so we're trying to keep our hands and minds busy until then.
We have taken temporary lodging in a place called Candlewood Suites, a residential hotel. We expect to be here from one to three months while we whip the A-frame into shape.
We've been out there a few times to look around and I am happy to report that:
* The chicken house is intact and will only require some cleaning up and a little repair.
* Apparently no one ever harvested the garlic we planted the October before we moved to Cooperstown and it has naturalized, so with no effort on our part, we will get to harvest garlic this summer!
A LOT of work will be required to bring the rest of the place up to snuff. We'll know more once we can get inside and see what needs to be done there. I'll take pictures next time we go out there and post one or two.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Moving
In late January we met a lovely couple who were looking to move to Cooperstown. They had a solid list of what they wanted, and were having trouble finding exactly what they were looking for in a house. When they listed their requirements to my husband Steve, he said, "Gee, that sounds like our house."
"Is your house for sale?"
"Oh, no."
"Well, could we take a look at it anyway?"
So they came to our house one weekend just before the middle of February and we showed them around. They fell in love with our house, just like we fell in love with it when we looked at it almost exactly seven years earlier and asked if we would consider selling it to them. Long story short, we quoted them a price and ...
The closing was on Wednesday April 8 and on Thursday the 9th we left Cooperstown with two rented trucks, our van and a trailer, all packed outrageously full of our earthly possessions, on our way back to Oklahoma.
A good thing about our businesses, mine as an artisan with an Internet store, and Steve's as a carpenter, is that these businesses are so portable. I can make jewelry and Steve can "make sawdust" anywhere that we can set up workspace. We look forward to setting up shop on our acreage in Mustang, Oklahoma.
Over the last seven years we have made so many dear friends in Cooperstown, Otsego County, throughout Central New York, and even across the state, both with my jewelry making and Steve's carpentry. We have both been quite active in the community as well and are sad to leave our many New York friends, but be assured, they do have mail service, phones, computers, and even the Internet in Oklahoma, so there is no reason we can't stay in contact!
If you're on my Holiday Card List or Birthday Card List I will be sending you an Address Change Notice shortly. Otherwise, you can email a request to vicki@eightsusquehanna.com, including your contact information so I can send you the updated address notice, too.
Don't be shy about posting any comments or questions - you can do this by clicking the COMMENTS link following this message.
Thanks for reading!
"Is your house for sale?"
"Oh, no."
"Well, could we take a look at it anyway?"
So they came to our house one weekend just before the middle of February and we showed them around. They fell in love with our house, just like we fell in love with it when we looked at it almost exactly seven years earlier and asked if we would consider selling it to them. Long story short, we quoted them a price and ...
The closing was on Wednesday April 8 and on Thursday the 9th we left Cooperstown with two rented trucks, our van and a trailer, all packed outrageously full of our earthly possessions, on our way back to Oklahoma.
A good thing about our businesses, mine as an artisan with an Internet store, and Steve's as a carpenter, is that these businesses are so portable. I can make jewelry and Steve can "make sawdust" anywhere that we can set up workspace. We look forward to setting up shop on our acreage in Mustang, Oklahoma.
Over the last seven years we have made so many dear friends in Cooperstown, Otsego County, throughout Central New York, and even across the state, both with my jewelry making and Steve's carpentry. We have both been quite active in the community as well and are sad to leave our many New York friends, but be assured, they do have mail service, phones, computers, and even the Internet in Oklahoma, so there is no reason we can't stay in contact!
If you're on my Holiday Card List or Birthday Card List I will be sending you an Address Change Notice shortly. Otherwise, you can email a request to vicki@eightsusquehanna.com, including your contact information so I can send you the updated address notice, too.
Don't be shy about posting any comments or questions - you can do this by clicking the COMMENTS link following this message.
Thanks for reading!
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
The Story of Eight Susquehanna
Carpenter Charles Lee Root came to Cooperstown in 1862 to work on a Clark Family property called Fernleigh, located along the banks of the headwaters of the Susquehanna River. He stayed on in Cooperstown and worked on every Clark property until the Lord called him home. His name is inscribed ("C.L. Root") in the cornerstone of the old firehouse on Chestnut Street, which can still be seen, preserved for its historical value, in the vestibule of the newer twentieth century firehouse at the same location. Mr. Root was the carpenter foreman on the Otesaga Hotel in the early 1900's, and built a home for his family with the same excellence in substance, craftsmanship, care and quality at the address of 8 Susquehanna Avenue. The house at 8 Susquehanna was continuously inhabited by Root family descendants until Malcolm Root died at the age of seventy in 2001.
Steve and Vicki Newby were fortunate enough to acquire the house in 2002 and always like to say that the good thing about this house was that they didn't do much to it and the bad thing about this house was that they didn't do much to it. Most of the original hardware was still in use or present on site, as was a great deal of knob and tube/silk-covered electrical wiring - still operative and in use in 2002! Vicki was initially dismayed at the electrician's insistance that all this old wiring be replaced until he explained in terms of safety. ("You're living on Grace that this house hasn't burned right down to the ground with this old wiring!")
The Newbys set about performing tasks of restorative maintenance and renovation to this lovely old home, deeply sensing Mr. Root's spirit and influence in the details.
In the fall of 2005 Vicki needed a pair of earrings to go with an outfit for a special occasion. Remembering she had an old case of beads, earwires, and other such supplies, she located it and made the earrings she needed. While she had the beads out, she adorned a barrette to match and made a bracelet and necklace while she was at it. Her friends complimented her on these unusual items, especially the barrette. Not long after that, some of her coworkers decided to put on a holiday craft sale, with a commission percentage to benefit the Cooperstown Food Bank. Vicki made up a passel of barrettes to take and, to her surprise and delight, sold every one! In an "Aha!" moment, her new hobby became a sideline business.
She decided to create a website for online sales. On the night of March 12, 2006 Vicki was filling out the application for her new website and came across the question, "What is the name of your business?" Hmmm, business needs a name. Vicki brainstormed previous enterprises with which she had been associated and discovered a commonality in that many of them were named after places - Red Brick Studio, True Light Carrot Patch - geographic centers of creativity - and borrowed from her address, 8 Susquehanna, as a name for her new jewelrymaking business, Eight Susquehanna. So it has been, and so it is. EightSusquehanna.
Steve and Vicki Newby were fortunate enough to acquire the house in 2002 and always like to say that the good thing about this house was that they didn't do much to it and the bad thing about this house was that they didn't do much to it. Most of the original hardware was still in use or present on site, as was a great deal of knob and tube/silk-covered electrical wiring - still operative and in use in 2002! Vicki was initially dismayed at the electrician's insistance that all this old wiring be replaced until he explained in terms of safety. ("You're living on Grace that this house hasn't burned right down to the ground with this old wiring!")
The Newbys set about performing tasks of restorative maintenance and renovation to this lovely old home, deeply sensing Mr. Root's spirit and influence in the details.
In the fall of 2005 Vicki needed a pair of earrings to go with an outfit for a special occasion. Remembering she had an old case of beads, earwires, and other such supplies, she located it and made the earrings she needed. While she had the beads out, she adorned a barrette to match and made a bracelet and necklace while she was at it. Her friends complimented her on these unusual items, especially the barrette. Not long after that, some of her coworkers decided to put on a holiday craft sale, with a commission percentage to benefit the Cooperstown Food Bank. Vicki made up a passel of barrettes to take and, to her surprise and delight, sold every one! In an "Aha!" moment, her new hobby became a sideline business.
She decided to create a website for online sales. On the night of March 12, 2006 Vicki was filling out the application for her new website and came across the question, "What is the name of your business?" Hmmm, business needs a name. Vicki brainstormed previous enterprises with which she had been associated and discovered a commonality in that many of them were named after places - Red Brick Studio, True Light Carrot Patch - geographic centers of creativity - and borrowed from her address, 8 Susquehanna, as a name for her new jewelrymaking business, Eight Susquehanna. So it has been, and so it is. EightSusquehanna.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Baking Day and Other Projects
Greetings, All!
Today I packaged and mailed an item I sold online, hung a light fixture, balanced the checkbook and baked a loaf of bread and two dozen cookies. This is what I love about being home more, is I can do more homey things.
I would love to be able to tell you it's been x-amount-of-time since we bought a loaf of commercially prepared bread from the store, but around the time of our holiday travels, both before and after, we did have to revert to store-bought a few times. If we have to get store-bought, we like that "Health Nut" bread or some such equivalent. I can say that in the last, oh, say, year and a half, we have only had to get store-bought bread about ten or twelve times. I love baking our own bread.
A million or so years ago when my kids were toddlers I read Let's Eat Right to Keep Fit and Let's Have Healthy Children by Adele Davis. She had in one of those books a recipe for whole wheat bread plus a particular technique in making it. Been a while since I made actual whole wheat bread, but I do still use the technique I learned from her. The great feature of this technique centers around waking up and feeding the yeast and then activating the gluten so the bread rises nicely and holds together well. I will share with you now my recipe and the preferred technique for baking bread:
Ingredients:
3/4 c hot tap water
1/4 c honey or maple syrup
1 T or 2 packets yeast
2 eggs
2 t salt
3 to 4 cups unbleached flour (I like King Arthur)
1 1/2 T cooking oil
A stand mixer or electric mixer are extremely handy for this technique.
You will also want a timer, such as a one hour wind up kitchen timer.
a cooling rack is helpful
Turn on the hot water faucet until the water is hot, but not so hot you can't stick your hand in it. You want it to be hot enough to wake the yeast up, but not so hot as to kill it. When the tap is hot, run your 3/4 c water as noted above. Then set the two eggs in another container deep enough that you can cover them with hot water. Set the eggs (in the hot water) aside to warm. We are warming the eggs so they won't chill the yeast mixture, putting it back to sleep.
Into the 3/4 c hot water, pour 1/4 c honey or maple syrup. Being cooler than the water, it will sink to the bottom of the water in the measuring cup, so stir gently to combine and pour into your mixing bowl. Add the yeast to the sweetened water mixture in the mixing bowl and stir gently to dampen. Set your timer for ten minutes.
When the bell rings look at the yeast mixture. It should have frothed up a little. This is good - it means your yeast has awakened, and that it likes the honey or syrup you've fed it.
Add the salt and the now slightly warmed eggs, and two cups of the flour. With regular mixer beaters, or the flat mixing beater if you happen to have a Kitchen Aid stand mixer, beat the batter on a medium to low setting (number 2 on the Kitchen Aid) for ten minutes. This makes a batter of a good consistency for stirring in this manner. If you don't happen to have an electric mixer of any sort, make a note to put one on your wish list and beat by hand for ten minutes. All this ten minutes of beating is important as it activates the gluten. By the end of the ten minutes your batter should be starting to get sort of a rubbery texture to it. When you pull the beaters or the spoon out of the dough it should look rubbery-stringy, a little like the texture of silly putty. This is good - this is the gluten - sort of a rubbery textured protein.
At the end of the ten minutes, turn the mixer off and lift the beater(s) out of the batter. Scrape any excess batter from the beaters back into the mixing bowl, and the beaters can then go into the wash sink. If you have a dough hook, put that onto the mixer. If you don't have a dough hook, you may look forward to a one-armed work-out.
Having a cup or two of flour handy, start gently stirring the batter with the dough hook or a very sturdy spoon or spatula. Gradually introduce flour into the mixture, about a quarter cup at a time. Sprinkle in the flour and mix it in. The mixture will get stiffer and stiffer as you go. This is where you will really wish you had at least an electric mixer, and at best a quality stand mixer. Remember: wish list. Keep slowly adding flour and mixing it in until it pulls away from the sides of the mixing bowl. Keep it up, slowly adding flour and mixing it in until the dough forms a ball.
On a flat working surface - wooden cutting board, ordinary (CLEAN!) countertop, or the like - sprinkle a little flour, and tump your dough ball out of the bowl and onto the flour. You'll want to scrape out of the bowl any that might have stuck to the sides, although there shouldn't be much of that if you mixed in enough flour. Set your mixing bowl and the rest of your utensils in the washing sink. We'll get back to them in a minute. Wash your hands with warm water and soap, rinse thoroughly, and dry them with a towl. Remove bracelets, watches, and any rings you don't want to get in the bread dough, or don't want to get bread dough into, and knead your bread. I push down into the dough and away from me with the heels of my hands, give the dough about a quarter turn, then push with the heels of the hands, and so on. Knead - I want to say until it feels right, but that is a vague term if you haven't kneaded bread much before - so knead about a dozen to twenty times.
I will pause here to say that I have heard people say, "Oh, yes, love to knead bread because it's such a great way to release tension, to get aggression out."
I say, "No!" I do not release aggression into my bread, and don't you do it either! When I knead my bread I imagine a column of bright, glittering white light light entering the top of my head, filling my being, and coming down my arms, out my hands, and into the bread. I imagine blessing, blessing and light, flowing into the bread as a gift to anyone who partakes. It gives me goosebumps of ecstacy right now just to think of it. Bless your bread!
Okay, back to making. Once you have kneaded your bread and it feels firm, uniform and cohesive, leave it to rest while you prepare a bowl for rising. I use the bowl I mixed it in. In that case, take a moment to wash the bowl and all the utensils used so far. Dry the inside of the bowl with a towel. Pour the oil in the bottom of the bowl. I specified 1 1/2 T because that is about how much it comes out to be, but really, if you just pour about a half-dollar sized puddle in the bottom of the rising bowl, that is fine. You can eyeball it.
So you have a clean rising bowl with a little oil in the bottom. Take your dough ball, smooth it, dust off any loose flour it might have picked up from the kneading board, and gently plop it, smooth side down, into the rising bowl, and then turn it over so the smooth oily side is up.
Most recipes at this point will say "let rise in a warm place," etc. I make a warm place for my bread to rise, and here's how: Get a large bowl or pan, large enough to set the rising bowl into, and fill it up to about three and a half inches deep with hot water (again, hot tap water is quite sufficient). I don't recommend using the sink for your warm water rising because what if someone should come by and, oh, say, wash their hands, or whatever, and splash soapy hand-washing water into your blessing filled bread dough? Eww! So use a big dish or some sort of pan that you can set by somewhere not-in-the-sink to rise. Once that is all set, cover the rising bowl with what we used to call a "tea towel," which is a kitchen towel made of a smooth, close-weaved fabric like cotton or linen, and take care to keep the towel out of the warming water.
Set your timer for one hour and go do whatever, keeping your ear tuned for the timer.
When the bell rings, come look at your dough. Hopefully it's risen noticeably. Now (Wash your hands first!) you will "punch it down." Again, I say, do this matter-of-factly and with love, without aggression: form a loose fist and press your knuckles into the dough, pressing the air bubbles out. Press, press, press the bubbles out - you'll hear them go "phht! phht!" - and then pick the dough up out of the bowl, form it back into a ball like shape with a smooth side, and set 'er back in the rising bowl. Lay the towel back over the rising bowl, set the timer for another hour, wash the oil off your hands, and go do whatever until the bell rings again.
This time when the bell rings, you'll want to start with getting your loaf pan ready and turn the oven on to 350 F to preheat. If you're using a metal loaf pan you'll want to grease all interior sides with shortening. Not oil, because that will make the bread stick. If you are using a glass pan, grease it, and you'll want to preheat the oven to 325 instead of 350. If you are so furtunate as to have such as one of those Pampered Chef stoneware loaf pans, you may want to give it ever so light a spritzing of non-stick spray if it's not yet seasoned.
Once the loaf pan is ready, punch your dough down in the bowl, and then tump it out onto the kneading board. Knead, this time with attention to popping as many little air bubbles as you can, as well as kneading for smoothness. Knead, press, roll, press, roll, press, roll, and so on, until you have an approximately loaf shaped giant stubby cigar of bread dough. If it has a seam (from pressing and rolling) set the seam side down in the loaf pan. We're going to let her rise thirty more minutes before she goes in the oven (kitchen timer again).
When that thirty minute timer goes off come take a look at the bread. It should have risen noticeably and will rise even more in the oven. Place in the oven, making sure there is enough room for the loaf to rise without getting stuck to the roof of your oven. Set the timer for thrity minutes and pay attention! When that bell rings, come look at the bread. Should be a nice golden brown toasty color. Carefully remove from the oven. You should be able to either turn the pan over and tump the loaf out, or lift it out with hot pads or mitts. If it doesn't want to let go, use a table knife or some other dull slender blade to run around the sides of the pan. Should come right out then. Handle delicately at this point! It's nice if you have a rack to cool it on. Let it set for at least ten-fifteen minutes before you try to cut into it. A knife with a long, sharp-edged blade is best for slicing; they make knives specifically for this purpose.
Man, oh, man, I'm tellin' you, fresh home-baked bread, filled with blessings and love, still warm from the oven, slathered with sweet cream lightly salted dairy butter - one of the great pleasures of life. Nothin' like it.
So go bless someone and make some bread!
In Light and Love,
Vicki
Today I packaged and mailed an item I sold online, hung a light fixture, balanced the checkbook and baked a loaf of bread and two dozen cookies. This is what I love about being home more, is I can do more homey things.
I would love to be able to tell you it's been x-amount-of-time since we bought a loaf of commercially prepared bread from the store, but around the time of our holiday travels, both before and after, we did have to revert to store-bought a few times. If we have to get store-bought, we like that "Health Nut" bread or some such equivalent. I can say that in the last, oh, say, year and a half, we have only had to get store-bought bread about ten or twelve times. I love baking our own bread.
A million or so years ago when my kids were toddlers I read Let's Eat Right to Keep Fit and Let's Have Healthy Children by Adele Davis. She had in one of those books a recipe for whole wheat bread plus a particular technique in making it. Been a while since I made actual whole wheat bread, but I do still use the technique I learned from her. The great feature of this technique centers around waking up and feeding the yeast and then activating the gluten so the bread rises nicely and holds together well. I will share with you now my recipe and the preferred technique for baking bread:
Ingredients:
3/4 c hot tap water
1/4 c honey or maple syrup
1 T or 2 packets yeast
2 eggs
2 t salt
3 to 4 cups unbleached flour (I like King Arthur)
1 1/2 T cooking oil
A stand mixer or electric mixer are extremely handy for this technique.
You will also want a timer, such as a one hour wind up kitchen timer.
a cooling rack is helpful
Turn on the hot water faucet until the water is hot, but not so hot you can't stick your hand in it. You want it to be hot enough to wake the yeast up, but not so hot as to kill it. When the tap is hot, run your 3/4 c water as noted above. Then set the two eggs in another container deep enough that you can cover them with hot water. Set the eggs (in the hot water) aside to warm. We are warming the eggs so they won't chill the yeast mixture, putting it back to sleep.
Into the 3/4 c hot water, pour 1/4 c honey or maple syrup. Being cooler than the water, it will sink to the bottom of the water in the measuring cup, so stir gently to combine and pour into your mixing bowl. Add the yeast to the sweetened water mixture in the mixing bowl and stir gently to dampen. Set your timer for ten minutes.
When the bell rings look at the yeast mixture. It should have frothed up a little. This is good - it means your yeast has awakened, and that it likes the honey or syrup you've fed it.
Add the salt and the now slightly warmed eggs, and two cups of the flour. With regular mixer beaters, or the flat mixing beater if you happen to have a Kitchen Aid stand mixer, beat the batter on a medium to low setting (number 2 on the Kitchen Aid) for ten minutes. This makes a batter of a good consistency for stirring in this manner. If you don't happen to have an electric mixer of any sort, make a note to put one on your wish list and beat by hand for ten minutes. All this ten minutes of beating is important as it activates the gluten. By the end of the ten minutes your batter should be starting to get sort of a rubbery texture to it. When you pull the beaters or the spoon out of the dough it should look rubbery-stringy, a little like the texture of silly putty. This is good - this is the gluten - sort of a rubbery textured protein.
At the end of the ten minutes, turn the mixer off and lift the beater(s) out of the batter. Scrape any excess batter from the beaters back into the mixing bowl, and the beaters can then go into the wash sink. If you have a dough hook, put that onto the mixer. If you don't have a dough hook, you may look forward to a one-armed work-out.
Having a cup or two of flour handy, start gently stirring the batter with the dough hook or a very sturdy spoon or spatula. Gradually introduce flour into the mixture, about a quarter cup at a time. Sprinkle in the flour and mix it in. The mixture will get stiffer and stiffer as you go. This is where you will really wish you had at least an electric mixer, and at best a quality stand mixer. Remember: wish list. Keep slowly adding flour and mixing it in until it pulls away from the sides of the mixing bowl. Keep it up, slowly adding flour and mixing it in until the dough forms a ball.
On a flat working surface - wooden cutting board, ordinary (CLEAN!) countertop, or the like - sprinkle a little flour, and tump your dough ball out of the bowl and onto the flour. You'll want to scrape out of the bowl any that might have stuck to the sides, although there shouldn't be much of that if you mixed in enough flour. Set your mixing bowl and the rest of your utensils in the washing sink. We'll get back to them in a minute. Wash your hands with warm water and soap, rinse thoroughly, and dry them with a towl. Remove bracelets, watches, and any rings you don't want to get in the bread dough, or don't want to get bread dough into, and knead your bread. I push down into the dough and away from me with the heels of my hands, give the dough about a quarter turn, then push with the heels of the hands, and so on. Knead - I want to say until it feels right, but that is a vague term if you haven't kneaded bread much before - so knead about a dozen to twenty times.
I will pause here to say that I have heard people say, "Oh, yes, love to knead bread because it's such a great way to release tension, to get aggression out."
I say, "No!" I do not release aggression into my bread, and don't you do it either! When I knead my bread I imagine a column of bright, glittering white light light entering the top of my head, filling my being, and coming down my arms, out my hands, and into the bread. I imagine blessing, blessing and light, flowing into the bread as a gift to anyone who partakes. It gives me goosebumps of ecstacy right now just to think of it. Bless your bread!
Okay, back to making. Once you have kneaded your bread and it feels firm, uniform and cohesive, leave it to rest while you prepare a bowl for rising. I use the bowl I mixed it in. In that case, take a moment to wash the bowl and all the utensils used so far. Dry the inside of the bowl with a towel. Pour the oil in the bottom of the bowl. I specified 1 1/2 T because that is about how much it comes out to be, but really, if you just pour about a half-dollar sized puddle in the bottom of the rising bowl, that is fine. You can eyeball it.
So you have a clean rising bowl with a little oil in the bottom. Take your dough ball, smooth it, dust off any loose flour it might have picked up from the kneading board, and gently plop it, smooth side down, into the rising bowl, and then turn it over so the smooth oily side is up.
Most recipes at this point will say "let rise in a warm place," etc. I make a warm place for my bread to rise, and here's how: Get a large bowl or pan, large enough to set the rising bowl into, and fill it up to about three and a half inches deep with hot water (again, hot tap water is quite sufficient). I don't recommend using the sink for your warm water rising because what if someone should come by and, oh, say, wash their hands, or whatever, and splash soapy hand-washing water into your blessing filled bread dough? Eww! So use a big dish or some sort of pan that you can set by somewhere not-in-the-sink to rise. Once that is all set, cover the rising bowl with what we used to call a "tea towel," which is a kitchen towel made of a smooth, close-weaved fabric like cotton or linen, and take care to keep the towel out of the warming water.
Set your timer for one hour and go do whatever, keeping your ear tuned for the timer.
When the bell rings, come look at your dough. Hopefully it's risen noticeably. Now (Wash your hands first!) you will "punch it down." Again, I say, do this matter-of-factly and with love, without aggression: form a loose fist and press your knuckles into the dough, pressing the air bubbles out. Press, press, press the bubbles out - you'll hear them go "phht! phht!" - and then pick the dough up out of the bowl, form it back into a ball like shape with a smooth side, and set 'er back in the rising bowl. Lay the towel back over the rising bowl, set the timer for another hour, wash the oil off your hands, and go do whatever until the bell rings again.
This time when the bell rings, you'll want to start with getting your loaf pan ready and turn the oven on to 350 F to preheat. If you're using a metal loaf pan you'll want to grease all interior sides with shortening. Not oil, because that will make the bread stick. If you are using a glass pan, grease it, and you'll want to preheat the oven to 325 instead of 350. If you are so furtunate as to have such as one of those Pampered Chef stoneware loaf pans, you may want to give it ever so light a spritzing of non-stick spray if it's not yet seasoned.
Once the loaf pan is ready, punch your dough down in the bowl, and then tump it out onto the kneading board. Knead, this time with attention to popping as many little air bubbles as you can, as well as kneading for smoothness. Knead, press, roll, press, roll, press, roll, and so on, until you have an approximately loaf shaped giant stubby cigar of bread dough. If it has a seam (from pressing and rolling) set the seam side down in the loaf pan. We're going to let her rise thirty more minutes before she goes in the oven (kitchen timer again).
When that thirty minute timer goes off come take a look at the bread. It should have risen noticeably and will rise even more in the oven. Place in the oven, making sure there is enough room for the loaf to rise without getting stuck to the roof of your oven. Set the timer for thrity minutes and pay attention! When that bell rings, come look at the bread. Should be a nice golden brown toasty color. Carefully remove from the oven. You should be able to either turn the pan over and tump the loaf out, or lift it out with hot pads or mitts. If it doesn't want to let go, use a table knife or some other dull slender blade to run around the sides of the pan. Should come right out then. Handle delicately at this point! It's nice if you have a rack to cool it on. Let it set for at least ten-fifteen minutes before you try to cut into it. A knife with a long, sharp-edged blade is best for slicing; they make knives specifically for this purpose.
Man, oh, man, I'm tellin' you, fresh home-baked bread, filled with blessings and love, still warm from the oven, slathered with sweet cream lightly salted dairy butter - one of the great pleasures of life. Nothin' like it.
So go bless someone and make some bread!
In Light and Love,
Vicki
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Holidays and Pictures
First I want to say that I have updated the photo gallery with a few more pics from our travels over Christmas time. You can see those photos at http://gallery.me.com/vlnewby . Check it out! Also, forget to check out my website EightSusquehanna.com.
Many thanks to my current followers and subscribers, and I'd like to remind the rest of you that you can also follow or subscribe to this blog by either clicking the "Follow this Blog" at the upper right corner of this page or by selecting one of the subscribe options ("Posts" or "All Comments") a little farther down on the right side of the page just below the "About Me" section or all the way at the bitty-bottom of the page.
We had a great time seeing all those branches of the Family Tree, and nary a prosimian in the bunch!
Yes, we love to travel and we love to get home.
Thanks for reading! Remember to take a peek at the photos and don't forget to visit my website, EightSusquehanna.com.
Happy New Year!
Many thanks to my current followers and subscribers, and I'd like to remind the rest of you that you can also follow or subscribe to this blog by either clicking the "Follow this Blog" at the upper right corner of this page or by selecting one of the subscribe options ("Posts" or "All Comments") a little farther down on the right side of the page just below the "About Me" section or all the way at the bitty-bottom of the page.
We had a great time seeing all those branches of the Family Tree, and nary a prosimian in the bunch!
Yes, we love to travel and we love to get home.
Thanks for reading! Remember to take a peek at the photos and don't forget to visit my website, EightSusquehanna.com.
Happy New Year!
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