Goat Panic and Wonderful Bread

Tuesday morning dawned bright and clear dark as night.  As the days shorten, my mornings require the light attached to my ball cap in order to be able to get around outside and get the critters cared for.  Often on mornings like this the goats are quite happy in their barn and aren't eager and cooperative about going outside.  Rainy days are worse.  Those days, I often have to pull some of them out of the barn.

So it wasn't unusual when I opened the door and walked into the dark barn that Lily, the black LaMancha, was lying down, sleeping.  I thought it was an odd location and she was in an odd position, but I know I sleep strangely sometimes, so I shouldn't be surprised goats do, too.  I decided to let her snooze as long as she wanted to while I put leashes on the other four goats first.  I kept glancing at her, watching for her to stir and get up.  She didn't.  I started getting worried.  There was a lot of ruckus in the barn, with the other goats tromping around and Salsa re-establishing her authority by pushing and butting the other goats around.

Finally, I couldn't put it off any longer.  Lily hadn't budged.  With a worried and hesitant tone in my voice, trying to sound a little confident as I started to walk toward her, imagining the worst, I said, "Hey, Lily, time to get up, girl."

OHTHANKGOODNESS.

Lily immediately lifted her head upon hearing her name, looked at me, and slowly stood up, stretching.  I felt like I'd been confronting a teenager who just wants to snooze just a little bit longer...  She punked me!  With a sigh of relief, I clipped the leash to her collar and gave her some extra scritches and scratches in all her best itchy places.  I let everyone out of the barn, relieved that I could still plan to breed her this fall.  Salsa's milk production is still good at 1/2 gallon a day, but she is visibly drying up and it's time to give another goat or two a shot at being milkers.

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I had what was turning into a long section of this post devoted to The Day I Slept Through Two Alarms.  Upon rereading it, I realized that it is really not that interesting to anyone else and I was bored reading it myself. Of note, the kids were only 10 minutes late and I got the tardies (four carpool kids) excused for them, and She Who Does Not Run or Jump (Me) ran.  'Nuff said.

So let's talk about Food, shall we?

Now that I am working full time again, my cooking exploits are jammed into every spare moment of the weekend, and I am frustrated because there's not enough time for all I want/need to do.  I am contemplating asking for a four-day work week, though not expecting any type of positive response to that.  Besides, with the pay being so low I'm not sure I could make it worthwhile ... though it is coming up on holiday season and I could ramp up soap making ...  Ah, to think of for another day.

I've been learning how to can pickles, both sweet and garlic/dill now.  I am a salsa and tomato soup making machine.  If you want to know about the Best Tomato Soup Ever, let me know and I'll write all about it and share the recipe.  I am spoiled by my homemade soup now and doubt I'll ever willingly go back to store-bought, ever.

I discovered that focaccia is really easy to make using a bread machine.  Super simple.  The problem with my homemade focaccia is that it is rather delicate and doesn't hold up well for sandwiches.  It makes a great base for my arugula and parmesan bruschetta, but BLTs, no.

Bex and I love to go to the Windsor Farmer's Market on Sunday mornings.  We have fallen in love with Mama Tina's new meatballs and sauce that she sells by the twos in a little pouch.  I can easily warm those up and slice them onto ciabatta rolls from the baker at the farmers market, topped with mozzarella cheese, for an easy and filling dinner.  I was contemplating that this weekend.  I doubt I could beat Mama Tina's meatballs, especially since she just won Double Gold at the Harvest Fair for them, but ciabatta bread.  Now that's another story.

I decided to try a bread machine recipe and see how it worked out.  The recipe said that the dough would be "sticky" and not to try to add flour to it.  As I looked at the dough after the bread machine was done with it, practically sloshing it around in the pan, I muttered to myself, "Sticky?  More like soupy!"  With some apprehension, I poured the dough/batter onto a floured cutting board, scooped the edges up as much as I could so it would fit under the largest mixing bowl I own, and set the timer, hoping that it wouldn't ooze out like The Blob all over the kitchen.  After 15 minutes was up, I gingerly removed the bowl and was relieved that it pretty much stayed together.  Despite flouring the sharpest knife I have, the dough still stuck to the knife and did not seem at all to want to be separated into two pieces.  I forced the issue and then transferred the halves to two floured pans to rest and rise for another 45 minutes.

Resting time after dough prep for the focaccia is just long enough to preheat the oven, about 15-20 minutes.  There's the extra time for the ciabatta.

I popped the risen dough into the oven for 25 minutes (25-30 is what the recipe calls for) and it was a little darker than I wanted it to be when I took it out, so I'll go for 20 next time.

What I received for my efforts were two good-sized beautiful rustic loaves of golden bread, crispy on the outside and light and perfect on the inside.  They were crispy enough without me bothering to spritz water on them every 5-10 minutes while they baked (I'm all about making it as simple as possible - why bother?).  I made a sandwich with part of the cooled loaf and discovered that it not only tasted good, but it held up very, very well.  I have a winner.

Sorry focaccia, you will be made for special occasions for the bruschetta, but ciabatta is my new go-to weekend bread making buddy, stickiness and all.

If you'd like to try your hand at ciabatta, the recipe is at http://allrecipes.com/recipe/ciabatta-bread/ and below.  (P.S. I did not "dimple" the bread.  Unnecessary for ciabatta.)  Enjoy!

Ciabatta Bread

Servings: 24
Submitted By: Marina    

"This is a bread machine version of the Italian classic which still bakes in your oven. Though not sour, this bread has the crisp crust and coarse crumb one expects from ciabatta."

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups water
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon white sugar
1 tablespoon olive oil
3 1/4 cups bread flour
1 1/2 teaspoons bread machine yeast

Directions:

1.     Place ingredients into the pan of the bread machine in the order suggested by the manufacturer. Select the Dough cycle, and Start.

2.     Dough will be quite sticky and wet once cycle is completed, resist the temptation to add more flour. Place dough on a lightly floured board, cover with a large bowl, and let rest for 15 minutes.

3.     Lightly flour or use parchment lined baking sheets. Divide into 2 pieces, and form each into a 3x14 inch oval. Place loaves on prepared sheets, dimple surface, and lightly flour. Cover, and let rise in a draft free place for approximately 45 minutes.

4.     Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C).

5.     Dimple dough for a second time, and then place loaves in the oven, positioned on the middle rack. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. During baking, spritz loaves with water every 5 to 10 minutes for a crispier crust.

My Pita Bread Looks Funny

Yesterday I remembered something.  There is a reason that my rolling pin stays lonely and forgotten in the kitchen drawer.  I haven't made sugar cookies since high school, because my rolling pin skills stink.  I pulled it out yesterday, forgetting those long ago days of misshapen and torn pie crusts and inept looking cookies.  The next recipe bookmarked in my new book was pita bread.

My dear friend, Jill, apparently has been paying attention to the stuff I spew on my Facebook page.  She sent me the link to a great book, knowing that I would be interested.  (I love you, Jill!)  Marin County wife and mother loses her job, and decides to find out if it's cheaper/better to make or buy some grocery items.  Jennifer Reese is a woman after my own heart.  She is bolder than I am (and has a very understanding, patient, and accommodating husband!) in that I don't believe that I will cure my own bacon "from scratch" or eat one of my chickens unless there is a horrible catastrophic event and there are no grocery stores or butcher shops left in the world.  After reading the book description, I decided that I wanted to read Make the Bread, Buy the Butter.  Jennifer makes this a romp through the grocery store and her kitchen ... and her back yard and neighborhood, as she brings home goats, chickens, and even bees, and tests her recipes on her patient (if often skeptical) family.

I want to - and will - try most of the recipes in this book.  I read it cover to cover (well, as much of a cover as you can find on an e-book) and then started going back to the bookmarked recipes that I want to try.  I've made a few that I haven't blogged about, but I recently decided to get methodical about this and start from the beginning, working my way to the end.  As I hit those recipes I've already made, I'll tell you all about them.

You might think I'm on a bread kick, but really, I just happen to be on that chapter!  Yesterday's adventure was pita bread.

According to Jennifer, the key to making pita with pockets is a hot-hot-hot oven with a hot-hot-hot pizza stone.  Thank goodness I didn't decide to try this in July.  As it is, heating the pizza stone on the bottom rack of my oven yesterday morning burned off all sorts of missed things that I didn't know were in there and would smoke up the house.  It was a cool spring morning, so opening the windows wasn't a problem.

I futzed with the rolling pin.  The dough stuck to it.  I floured.  I got flour all over.  I forgot to wear my apron.  I got impatient.  I realized that 16 pitas from this recipe at 1/4" each was too many, at least for the dough I produced.  I modified the amount halfway through the dough.  Most of my pita circles weren't exactly circles, but I put them on the hot baking stone anyway.  I waited impatiently for eight minutes.  I didn't peek.

There are definitely pockets in my pitas.  They look like little bread balloons, but I think that's okay.  They aren't flat, plastic-packaging- and store-shelf-ready, but they are probably closer to the original concept than today's store-bought pitas, which often tear apart as you try to open the "pocket." 

Most of them aren't circular, but they taste ...

WONDERFUL!!!

Especially with homemade cream cheese stuffed into the pocket.  Hee.  I'll bet that when I learn to make them the proper size they might even be a great substitute for hamburger buns, and we can stuff that Amazing BBQ Pulled Chicken inside!

New Beginnings

There has been a huge gap in my blog postings, which I really didn't expect to happen.  I suppose it's a combination of things.  One is that the speed of life has been so dizzying, there hasn't been a lot of time for contemplation before a keyboard.  The wee hours of weekend mornings that I love to use to write have often been consumed by oversleeping because I'm transcribing too late at night, transcription because I'm trying to keep up with a big onslaught of work at home, or a pre-teen who surprises me by getting up early.

There's also this thing that has happened over the last couple of blog postings.  I like what I've written, and an audience began to develop.  I saw people checking the blog regularly to see if something new was posted.  That made me feel great.  I also allowed it to make me feel as if I had to do something more than just be me.  I set expectations for blog posts higher than I'd had when I started this mission.  I started believing that I needed to have a "wow factor" in order to post something.  It had to be entertaining, funny, insightful, educational, or ... something more than my everyday life.  What happens when I set goals too high is that I start feeling that I can't reach them, and just sit and stare at them for a while.  Uh-oh, I got stuck.

The way to get unstuck is to just start moving again.  Or as Dorey in "Finding Nemo" says, "Just keep swimming, just keep swimming," paraphrased of course - this is from memory.

Moments over the last month?  Here they are, and I hope you enjoy.  I know I have, for the most part.

Cooking!  Baking!  I've been spending a lot of time in the kitchen.  Part of it is that I'm trying to do weekday prep on the weekends, so we have food that's easy to prepare and healthy to eat during the week.  Another goal is to use as much milk as I possibly can, so it doesn't go to waste.  I've been making a crockpot yogurt every weekend with mixed results.  I love the flavor, and Becca uses it with fruit to make a smoothie to down before we head out to school - often drinking it in the car.  The downside is that I've had a hard time with the texture.  It's been like a slightly thickened milk.  That's fine for smoothies, but not much else, and I don't like drinking my yogurt all the time.  I used a different starter yogurt culture last time that worked better, and picked up a tip that using a little tapioca flour might help.  I'll try that and let you know how it works.

Cajeta is a fixture every weekend, and more and more people are trying and loving it.  I've been told it will be okay to sell some at the school Christmas craft fair, so that is on deck.  I've been trying to figure out how to provide samples.  I started off thinking of buying tiny spoons, but don't like the idea of so much waste.  Next, small cookies?  Maybe.  After the apple/pear/cheese tasting last weekend, I decided that apple slices are the *perfect* way to showcase the deliciousness of cajeta, in addition to providing an idea for its use in a real fashion.

I discovered a fabulous honey wheat bread recipe that I modified and have been making every weekend.  When Becca doesn't want yogurt, we toast slices of this bread and smear homemade apple butter on it for an easy start to the day.  Yum!  I'll post the recipe below.

In addition to the apple butter, which is fabulous and also made in the crockpot, I've been making focaccia.  Dropping ingredients into the bread machine and using the dough setting makes prep easy.  After that, shaping the dough on a cookie sheet and brushing with olive oil before baking is all that is needed to finish it.  I discovered a lovely Meyer Lemon Olive Oil at the farmers market a couple weeks ago, and it is *perfect* brushed on top of the focaccia.

I make both the bread and focaccia using whey instead of water, which imparts more nutrients and lovely flavor and texture to the breads.  It also allows me to use the whey so it doesn't go to waste after making cheese.  I am still trying to perfect cheesemaking, and currently have a Camembert attempt started in the fridge.

Those goats are still keeping us on our toes!  They have been well behaved the last few weeks, but a couple days ago we made a mistake and ended up on a trek in the dark looking for an errant goat.  Typically, we put leashes on the big girls (Lily and Salsa) and Imbri, letting the youngest Nigerian goats trot off to the barn themselves, as they are most likely to do.  Imbri has a habit of going to the barn instead of waiting at the milk stand, but Salsa is good about hopping right up for her food.  Lily likes to wander about and nibble on interesting plants, so she needs firm guidance to get to the barn.

It was Friday night, and dark when we got home after dinner at my parents' in Novato.  Salsa was loudly telling everyone that morning that she was in heat, and she greeted us with a yell (and another and another) when we drove up.  When we put leashes on the goats and let them out, Becca and I both forgot that when Salsa is in heat, she doesn't behave properly.  As soon as she was out of the pen, she walked the opposite direction, and we both realized that we were going to have to chase her down.  We decided to get all the rest of the goats into the barn first, so we didn't have to run around after FIVE instead of just one.

We walked in the dark, with only the light from the flashlight gizmo mounted on my cap (I LOVE THIS HANDS-FREE FLASHLIGHT), stars flickering in the sky, but no moon.  The motion-detected light at the front of the house was on, so we could see Salsa standing near the gate to her pen, in addition to hearing her bleat loudly.  She started to walk away from us, so Becca headed down behind her, while I walked the upper driveway in an attempt to head her off at the pass.  Too slow.  I was 2/3 of the way there, when Salsa popped out of the path between the bushes and started walking away from me.  I called her gently, and she started to trot with intention.  She was on a mission to find bucks.

Becca joined me, and we held hands as we got to the end of our driveway and turned left, up the hill toward my landlady's house and animals.  It was so dark that we couldn't see anything but the circle of light from my flashlight on the driveway in front of us.  This made me a little nervous, and I suggested that we go get the car, but Becca was fine.  I angled the light up a little, we saw a faint glint of white up the drivway, and kept on walking.  Salsa had quit yelling, so it was hard to tell exactly where she was, but as we neared the gate to my landlady's goats, we saw her white coat glowing on the right side of the driveway.  She had her nose pressed against the fence, and one of my landlady's bucks was on the other side of the fence, nuzzling her nose and making blubbering noises.  She didn't want to leave him, so Salsa didn't try to run away when Becca grabbed her leash.

We turned and headed back down the dark driveway, and she was fine until the buck quit following along on the other side of the fence.  Then she started to pull back and yell again.  I had to grab Becca's arm a couple of times on our way to the milk stand, so that she didn't get pulled over by Salsa trying to go the other direction.  She is a LaMancha/Saanan full sized goat, and outweighs Becca.

The rest of the evening was uneventful, but it was a lesson that we didn't forget the next night we got the goats out of the pen.  Salsa is in heat for 2-3 days, and should be over it by tonight, but we'll still hold onto that leash at least for another couple nights to be sure she doesn't run off.

We had a good day yesterday, meeting Amanda, Jessica, and Marie for Amanda's first foray into wedding dress shopping.  What an endeavor!  The selections are so overwheming, and so beautiful.  We had a ball looking around and helping Amanda select dresses to try on, and then watching her model each of the selections for us.  The first one she tried on blew us all away.  It was absolutely perfect on her, and there was nothing else after it that gave us the same impact.  She tried it on one more time at the end, and we all concluded that this is probably *the* dress.  There are two wedding shows next weekend, however, and Mandi wants to see if she can win a gown before committing, so she will wait.  I think this is the winner, though.  If you are looking for a wedding gown, check out Wine Country Bride in Santa Rosa.  They have a fabulous selection of reasonably priced gowns, and the service is SUPERB.

One of our favorite restaurants, Las Guitarras in Cotati, is closing.  We are so bummed about it.  It is hard for me to make it there since we've moved, but that has always been one of my favorite restaurants.  We made it a point to meet up with my parents for lunch there after wedding dress shopping, and had good food, times, in good company.

We will be getting ready to attend the wedding today, 10-10-10, of the mother of one of Becca's best friends.  It's the perfect day for it!

You might wonder about the title - New Beginnings?  Where?  Well, it's me starting to blog regularly, even if I'm worried about what my "audience" might think.  It's wedding dress shopping for Amanda's new and renewed commitment with Anthony next year.  It's a farewell to a good restaurant, after losing a good man that managed it, and a new beginning for that building, while Las Guitarras Novato continues on strong.  Finally, a new beginning for Diane and Reuben - may they have a lifetime of happy years together.

Honey Wheat Bread - Bread Machine Recipe

This recipe is modified from the Mabon Marigold Honey Wheat Bread posted by girlichecf on blogspot.com. You can find her original recipe posted here.  The link also contains the recipe for the AWESOME Apple Butter I've been making with local, in season Gravensteins.

1 cup warm water (or warm whey)
1/3 cup honey
3 tablespoons melted butter
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 cups bread flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons yeast

Place ingredients into the bread machine in the order listed, making a dent in the side of the flour to place the yeast in.  Select the wheat setting, choose the crust color and loaf size, and start.  My bread machine bakes this in about 3 1/2 hours.  No fuss, wonderful aroma in the house, great treat!