I find these projects and skills that I have a urgent need to learn and conquer. Most times, I do it, check it off the list and move on. Some times it sticks with me. Crochet is one of those challenges that has stuck. I decided to make some blankets for Christmas gifts in 2009 and that begun my crazy obsession with yarn and why I had to get even more creative with our limited storage in our apartment.

Cooking is another one of those things. I love to cook. I especially love to bake. I find myself daydreaming of meal plans and ingredients. I wake up excited about what kind of food I can make that day. I checkout giant cooking books from the library and look forward to grocery shopping at Henry’s Market on Wednesdays for our weekly groceries items. I challenge myself to make meals out of the sale items for the week. It’s a little game I like to play in my own mind, in my own kitchen.

With cooking and baking I find things within the subject to challenge me. My recent challenge has been sourdough bread. One of my good friends, who is also obsessed with all things food, has been telling me that I need to try and make sourdough bread, from scratch. Now, after hearing her stories of the smell and failure of sourdough starter, I wasn’t really in a hurry to begin this challenge so I set it in the back of my mind. At the library a few weeks ago I found this book by James Peterson

It’s a wonderful book with great pictures and tips on baking pretty much anything. In this book I ran across sourdough bread starter and figured I might as well give it a try. So, my journey began…

If you ever decide to take this journey, here are a few tips:

1) It’s going to smell weird. It’s creating yeast, it’s not supposed to smell like roses. If it does smell like roses, you probably did something wrong and should start over.

2) Keep it tightly covered and set the bowl of starter on a place mat or fabric of some kind. Don’t set it on a counter or stove.

3) Don’t open your kitchen window. Try to keep the temperature consistent during the first week of the starter’s life.

4) Do read the recipe fully before starting so you can get your schedule straight for when you can start baking.

5) Make sure to use organic stone ground wheat flour during the first few days of making the starter. I used it the whole time because I wanted to bake whole wheat sourdough.

6) I’ve heard some horror stories of mold growing. If it turns funny colors, throw it out and start over.

I was afraid that the bread was going to be awful especially because it takes a lot of time to get this stuff going. You have to feed and water the starter every day just like a pet. Adam and I do not have pets, nor do we want any.

After about 8 days I was ready to start my recipe for the bread. The starter was finished and I wanted to test it out. I didn’t schedule things quite right and the day that I needed to bake the bread was a bit hectic. I ended up baking it at 10pm that night.

The bread turned out well to my utter surprise. A part of me wanted it to fail so I didn’t have to keep taking care of the starter and another part of me wanted it to be great because I had spent over a week taking care of this thing. The flavor was good and the bread had a nice chew to it. I was a little saddened with the rise though. I think the rise problem was due to a few things that I will play with the next time around. I am going to try these things out to see if I can get it to rise better.

1) Use 1/4 cup more bread flour.

2) Knead the dough a bit longer to shape it.

3) Proof it in a proofing box.

if that doesn’t work

4) Use a combo of starter and commercial yeast.

Here is the end result (Sorry for the lame iPhone camera quality. It’s all I had around when the bread finished)

]]> http://chelseapowell.wordpress.com/2010/05/18/food-challenge/feed/ 0 chelseapowell baking_ Sourdough Challenge 2010 http://chelseapowell.wordpress.com/2010/05/10/etsy/ http://chelseapowell.wordpress.com/2010/05/10/etsy/#comments Mon, 10 May 2010 17:58:27 +0000 chelseapowell http://chelseapowell.wordpress.com/?p=91 ]]> Here is some of what I’ve been up to over the past few months.

Etsy

I finally got my etsy shop set-up. You can check it out here

Music

My Band

www.adamsandeves.com

Venue Adam and I help with

http://theparkgallery.blogspot.com/

Germany

Adam and I are going to Germany in October for 2 weeks. I have been trying to learn a little bit of the language and make arrangements for that. It’s a lot of work to go on vacation. We are super excited though! If nothing else we have backpacks, passports and plane tickets. Look out Germany, here we come!

I have also been doing all kinds of crafting and baking during my few moments of spare time lately. I hope to start keeping my blog up-to-date with these wonderful adventures. Life is grand.

“Heavenly Father, you always amaze me
Let your kingdom come in my world and in my life
Give me the food I need to live through today
And forgive me as I forgive the people that wrong me
Lead me far from temptation
Deliver me from the evil one

I look out the window the birds are composing
Not a note is out of tune or out of place
I walk to the meadow and stare at the flowers
Better dressed than any girl on her wedding day

So why do I worry?
Why do I freak out?
God knows what I need
You know what I need

Your love is
Your love is
Your love is strong
Your love is
Your love is
Your love is strong
Your love is
Your love is
Your love is strong

The kingdom of the heavens is now advancing
Invade my heart, invade this broken town
The kingdom of the Heavens is buried treasure
Would you sell yourself to buy the one you’ve found?

Two things you told me
That you are strong
And you love me
Yes, you love me

Your love is
Your love is
Your love is strong
Your love is
Your love is
Your love is strong
Your love is
Your love is
Your love is strong
Your love is
Your love is
Your love is strong

Our God in Heaven
Hallowed be thy name
Above all names
Your kingdom come
Your will be done
On earth as it is in heaven
Give us today our daily bread
Forgive us weary sinners
Keep us far away from our vices
And deliver us from these prisons”

I only have a few minutes, but I’m planning on really getting with blogging regularly now that holidays and vacations are over. So, stay tuned….

I am in the middle of reading Pagan Christianity right now. It’s an amazing book. I have so much to say about it, but I don’t have the time to even begin right now. As I read it, I will be blogging about it. Some friends and I started a book club. We got together last night and everyone decided to read through Pagan Christianity together. It will be interesting to get different perspectives on it.

Time to lay down and take it easy now. Tomorrow is the big day.

Today I hiked Cowles Mountain with a friend. It was beautiful up there. I had never been and apparently it is the highest point in the city of San Diego. There is a 360 degree view of the city from up there. It was a little overcast this morning, but still a beautiful view none-the-less.I love hiking. I like to be outdoors and get my heart rate up. Plus, I was accompanied by a dear friend so you can’t really ask for a better way to start your morning.

This afternoon I watched Laelia for a little while. She is just the most adorable thing! We were playing with one of her toys that has all these different musical sounds. Oh how she loves music. She just starts dancing and laughing. I can’t get enough of it. It cracks me up.

Tonight is date night. Woohoo! Today has been a wonderful day!

Adam and I went tent camping with two other couples for New Years. It was so much fun. It was very cold, but as long as the fire was going everything was alright. The campground was all covered with snow, but we managed so find a dry campsite to call home for two days. we intended to just be gone for one but had so much fun that we stayed another night.

I never really went camping growing up so I am enjoying this new found outdoor activity. I like not really knowing what time it is. I like going to sleep because it’s dark and I am tired. I like waking up because it’s light and the birds are singing. It’s nice to be off a “I have to get these things done at these times” schedule. Waking up with the sun and enjoying God’s creation first thing in the morning is so refreshing. I tend to get more and more rigid the busier I get. I don’t stop to breath and enjo, I just power through to make it. I think we started the new year off right.

I am very excited for 2009. Adam and I have talked a lot about what God has been doing in our hearts and what we see/want to happen for this year. We’ve made some decisions that might be tough, but they are good. God has given us such a love and passion for our community. We intend on focusing much of our time in 2009 on the people in the community and doing things we are passionate about. We have decided to shy away from being a part of every little program and event to really focus quality time on this area, the people in our lives/around us and our marriage. Focusing quality time on our marriage is something we have always been very careful about protecting and continue to make decisions to do so.

Adam is going to be playing with Red Pony Clock again till July. He also plans on working on more of his music. I plan on working on music,crafts, cooking with friends/teaching others how to cook and going through books with others who enjoy good reads as much as me.

Speaking of good reads… I’ve got a pile of wonderful books to start reading. I haven’t decided where to start yet…so I haven’t started yet. I think I will this week though.

Here are a couple photos from our trip

Friday I went up to Escondido early in the morning to get my car looked at and talk with my Dad. Afterwards, I met up with my brother for breakfast. Had a great time talking about stuff. I’m so proud of him. He is getting his masters (all A’s and his greek prof told him he has the makings to be a greek scholar), leads the college group, works part time for my dad, is in charge of missions, overseas small groups (getting ready to hand that off though), is an elder and still finds time to be with people and make them feel like the most important thing going on. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t sleep at all though. After breakfast we picked up my nana and took her out to finish her christmas shopping and wrapped all the gifts she had. It is just too hard for her to do that stuff now. I’ve taken her to finish her shopping for the past 5 years or so and it’s one of my favorite traditions. My grandparents were always very involved in our lives. When my mom passed away, I don’t know what I would’ve done without them. They helped me keep it all together. My nana took over my home schooling. She should get some kind of national recognition just for that. She put up with a lot from me. She became one of my dearest friends during the hardest part of my life. After spending the day in Escondido I headed home to change and go to “The Habitat” and see old friends. 

Adam’s family came over tonight. They brought dinner and we watched Home Alone. A true Christmas classic. I feel like a little kid waiting for Christmas to come. I’m not sure what it is this year, but I’m just really excited about it. We are really blessed with our families and friends and I just find myself really appreciating everyone around us so much. It’s interesting to see who God places in our lives through different parts of the journey. I’m excited for the year to come. I think it holds a lot of new stuff for us but stuff that God has been preparing our hearts to do over the past year.

Before Adam’s parents came over, I was baking biscotti. Something I do every year and am pretty good at. I don’t know what happened, but the first batch came out all messed up. It nearly stole my christmas cheer with every crumble. I’m still not sure what all happened. I’ve never had anything like that happen while cooking/baking before. It will remain the Christmas mystery I guess. The second batch came out perfect. Strange.

Spent a lot of time wrapping presents yesterday. I don’t know why, but I really love to wrap presents. It’s probably one of my favorite things to do around the holidays.

The gifts are under the tree, the goodies are nearly baked, party going is almost complete and it’s time to settle in and just relax.