First Day of Limbo

The day begins sunny and bright, looks like it will be a nice one today. I think a walk will be in order around lunch time. My group will be interesting as we slide headlong into an indeterminate period prior to dissolution. We have a couple of on-going research projects to wrap up as best we can, and also the larger job of finding a permanent (as if that exists) job.

The past weekend was reasonably nice - I felt rather anxious on Sunday out of the blue - but a bout of bread making and chicken stock creating was good at dispelling that. In line with my work I also started an experiment based on reading about baguette making in paris. I heard that the dough contains only flour, water, salt and yeast, and that the award winning guy ferments his dough for 30 hours instead of the usual 3. That is intriguing 'cause I play with macrobiotic stuff (making yoghurt, beer, natto, sprouts...) in the kitchen already - plus all the bread I like to make. So I made a batch of bread and split it, making one be just white flour, salt, water, yeast... plus some olive oil and honey; the other my usual path, using various flours and additives like psyllium husk and ground flax.

Both batches were turned into a fully kneaded dough ready for rising, but only the brown batch was risen, shaped, proofed and baked. The other one is still on its first rise 15 or 20 hours later. I'll do the final proofing and baking tonight.

Anyway, that's a valuable experiment. Lots of fun - not so great at work.