What’s in a Name?

I have always been fond of names.  My own is quite lovely, if I do say so myself.  I like the way it sounds.  I like the story about the choice of it.  I love what it means.  That said, there are times and places in which I am leery of giving it out.  This is one of them.  It’s not that I don’t stand behind anything I plan to publish here.  But I do want to keep my personal writings, be they mere musings or full-on feminist rages, separate from my professional writings.  So I went in search of a pseudonym.
 

My friend Bob deserves credit for Anne of Cleaves.  I started with Anne, and he suggested “Anne of Cloves.”  I’m neither an Anglophile nor a history buff, but I did recognize the reference to Anne of Cleves, fourth wife of Henry VIII.  I turned it down because I don’t care much for cloves.  But his next pitch, “Anne of Cleavers,” suited me quite well.

You might be wondering what happened to the r.  Well, there is a derby gal who goes by Anne of Cleavers.  I don’t know her, having learned about her from a Google search, and I don’t know if she has copyrighted the name.  But I love flat-track roller derby, and I didn’t want to run over a fellow feminist’s toes.

I fussed about what to do.  I considered going back to “Anne of Cloves,” but I just couldn’t reconcile that pseudonym to me.  Then I started thinking about the meaning of cleave.  One meaning is to sunder.  Hence the cleaver gets its name, presumably.  But it also means to join together, becoming one.

I plan for this blog to be a place to share both my feminism and my recipes.  I suspect that many people will see them as unrelated aspects of my character.  But there are no unrelated aspects of one’s self.  I find myself having to explain to many people (even some feminists) that I can be feminist and enjoy traditionally feminine pursuits and performances.  I can be a feminist and wear a plunging neckline.  I can be a feminist and take my husband’s surname.  I can be feminist and be anything.  I can be anything because I am a feminist.

So sit back and watch me cleave.

~ Anne

Sourdough Starter

Sourdough starter is freakishly easy.  No really.  I used to think otherwise, too.  Then I asked my friend Nikki for some of her starter.  That's when she explained that it's nothing more than flour and water.  (She also sent me the link to S. John Ross' Sourdough page.)

Ingredients

Double, double toil & trouble
Fire burn, & cauldron bubble

Unbleached flour
Unfiltered water
A jar with a snug lid
A cool, dark place
Patience

Process

Put equal amounts of flour & water in the jar, close the lid tight & shake it.  Unscrew the lid to "burp" it.  Re-close the jar & put it in your cool, dark place.  

That's a lot of hooch!

In a few days, take the jar out.  Hooch should have formed.  Some sourdough aficionados advocate pouring off the hooch before adding in more flour and water.  I say shake it up.  Then add a couple of tablespoons each of flour & water.  This constitutes "feeding" your starter, which you must do at least once a week.


Ross recommends feeding your starter every day.  I'm pretty sure Nikki feeds hers daily, too.  I don't.  I suspect it has to do with where I store my yeasty-beasties... the liquor cabinet.  Feed yours as often as seems right.

That's also a lot of hooch!

How much flour and water you add will depend on two factors.  First, the more starter you have, the more you need to feed it.  So you'll want to increase the amount of flour you use each time.  If your starter has a lot of hooch, you probably want to back off of the water a bit.
After you add the flour & water, close the jar, shake it, burp it, re-close it.  Put your starter back in its home.  Keep doing this until your starter smells sour.  That means that your yeasty-beasties are ready to help you make some Sourdough Bread!  Shake up your starter & start proofing your sponge.

If you have too much starter, and you're not ready to make bread, you have a couple of options.  You can throw some of the starter out so that you have room to continue feeding it, or you can split it.  Remember, most people don't realize how easy this is.  You can always find someone who will take some of your starter, and you'll seem so generous.  They don't need to know it's just costing you some water, flour, and a jar.

Sourdough Bread

There are a few tricks to successful sourdough.  One of them is to be sure to use unbleached flour in both your starter and your dough.  Also, you need to be sure that you sift the flour as you mix it in.  In my experience, you need to add what seems to be too much flour into the dough, otherwise the dough is difficult to handle after the first rise.  Finally, with sourdough, you must be patient.  The first rise may take less than an hour, or it may take a full day.  It depends on how the yeasty-beasties feel on the day you make your bread.  I usually plan on a batch of sourdough taking a full weekend to make; however, I have had some loaves that went from starter to golden loaf in less than 10 hours.

Ingredients

Fresh Sourdough Loaves

1 cup proofed sponge (starter)

1/2 cup scalded skim milk (cooled to warm)

2 T butter

2 T honey

1 t sea salt (table salt is fine)

3ish cups unbleached flour

extra butter to grease the bowl and loaf pan

Proofing the Sponge

Mix your starter with 1/4 cup of unbleached flour & 1/4 cup of filtered water in a bowl (preferably glass).  It's important that the water be filtered as the chlorine in most tap water will kill your yeasty-beasties.  Cover the bowl and set it in a warmish place to proof.  (I put mine in the oven to keep it out of drafts.)

It's okay if it looks like this rather than bubbly all over.

When the top is bubbly, you're ready to go.  If you let the sponge sit for quite a while, it will look kind of gross, having developed a hooch.  Just stir it back down into the sponge when you get ready to start.  Generally speaking, the longer you proof your sponge, the more sour your sourdough.

You'll need one cup of sponge for your bread.  The remaining sponge should be put in an air tight jar as the starter for your next foray into sourdough baking.

Making Some Dough

Scald the milk & butter in a small sauce pan.  (I cut the butter up, but it's not necessary.)  It's best if you don't stir it, but you won't harm it if you do.  Once there are tiny bubbles around the edge of the milk (the butter should be nearly melted, if not completely so), stir in the honey & the salt.  Set the milk mixture aside to cool sufficiently.

"What constitutes 'cool sufficiently'?" you ask.  Good question... Warmer than room temperature, but cool enough that you can stick your finger in it without thinking "that's still hot."
 
Grease a glass bowl with butter & set it aside.
  
Sift 2 cups of flour into a separate, large bowl.  When the milk mixture has cooled, stir it and the sponge into the flour.  When you have a nice, wet dough, stir in at least another cup of sifted flour 1/2 cup at a time.  The dough will be getting difficult to stir.  On a floured surface (need I say "sifted") knead more sifted flour into the dough until it becomes difficult to handle.

Unrisen dough.  Is "unrisen" a word?

Gather up the dough into a giant ball, and place it in the greased bowl.  Turn the dough over so the top side is also greased.  Cover the bowl with a damp cloth, then set the dough aside to rise.  (My kitchen counters are below a vent, so I typically warm my oven a wee bit then place the bowl in there to rise.)

It has risen!

Ideally, you want your sourdough to swell up to at least double.  Sometimes this takes quite a while.  I usually let mine rise overnight. When it's done, the top may be a little dry.  That's okay.  

One time, my yeasty-beasties had so much fun rising, they partied out of the bowl and all over the bottom of the oven.  That was by far the best loaf I ever made.  I shoot for yeasty-beasty super-party every time now.

First fold.

When the dough has risen to double, punch it down, turn it out of the bowl onto a floured surface, and allow the dough to rest for about 5 minutes. 

Many bakers form the dough into a ball, cut an X in the top, and place it on a baking sheet to rise before baking.  I prefer to form it into a loaf... 

Grease a loaf pan.

Seam pinched & sealed

On a floured surface, use a rolling pin to roll the dough into a large rectangle.  (I try to get it to about 16 inches by 20 inches.)  Then fold it into thirds.   

Roll the dough up, and pinch the edge closed.  Roll it back and forth gently to seal the edge a bit more and to even the loaf out.  Pinch the ends closed, and place the loaf in the greased loaf pan.  Cover the loaf with a damp cloth and set it aside to rise.

When the dough has risen to your liking (ideally, about double), remove the cloth and place it in the oven.  Turn the oven on to 400 degrees (Fahrenheit). 

Most people preheat the oven.  I don't.  If you want to preheat it, by all means, do you.  This is your bread, after all, and you can do whatever you want with it.

Bake for about 40 minutes, or until the top is a dark golden and the loaf sounds hollow when you tap on it.  Turn the bread onto a cooling rack immediately to cool.

Helpful Links

When learning to make sourdough, I found the following websites to be extremely helpful.

About.com Basic Sourdough Recipe 
(You can see that this recipe heavily influenced my own.)

Sourdough Baking, The Basics by S. John Ross 
(This is where I learned a lot of the tricks of sourdough.)