Pasadenans and Altadenans Making Homemade Bread with Love

It was over three weeks ago that we entered a new world of simply staying-at-home due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

By Jennifer Hall Lee

It’s been stressful. My experience at a grocery store was certainly unusual. I saw empty shelves and no bread. No bread! I’m a weekly sourdough baguette gal, and I stood in shocked silence.

I quickly turned to the baking aisle to buy dried yeast in order to bake my own bread, and that too, was gone. Desperate times lead to extreme measures. I was going to have to make my own bread with my own starter (sourdough). I certainly had the time.

Starter

Starter is the live culture that you need in order to make the bread. It’s a living bubbly gob that lives in a jar and you cultivate it daily.

I found the simplest and oldest of sourdough starter recipes: flour and water.

The history of sourdough bread dates back to ancient Egypt, and we have a colorful history right here in California. Gold prospectors in the 19^th century baked their own bread and carried their personal jars of bread starter in their backpacks. The miners had to coddle that bubbling starter to keep it alive in the cold northern California air so they brought it into their bedding at night and warmed it with their body heat. They loved their starters. (Hang on to that word, love.)

We may not be prospectors but we are living in a time that could be pioneering for us. The changes we are witnessing may become permanent, but they don’t have to be negative.

Time

Baking your own bread is a relatively simple task that takes time.

John Pollard, a set dresser for motion pictures, started his foray into bread-baking the day after the film on which he was employed was put on pause due to the pandemic. He saw that “all the bread disappeared in the stores.” Moreover, he would finally have the time to make bread. (Time, hang on to that word, too.)

He started his first loaf with dried yeast he already had in his home since he was an avid pizza maker. Now he has turned to making his own starter.

When you mix the flour and water you must leave it uncovered for the first day to enable as much wild yeast as possible to land upon it. Pollard said “I love the whole idea of getting yeast out of the air.”

Yes, yeast is airborne and friendly.

Excess

Kristy Brauch-Clougherty, a master gardener “was feeling a little helpless” during the early days of the pandemic and she is an experienced sourdough starter person. Years ago, she had been offered homemade sourdough bread from a friend who had brought back a starter from the family home in Montana.

Brauch-Clougherty tasted the bread and “was hooked.” Her friend gave her some of that Montana starter and a set of instructions for bread-making. As you will soon see, the rest is history.

But first, check out this sourdough starter fact: in order to keep starter alive and contained you must remove the excess. Some of us will take that excess and give it away. Others will use it to make sourdough muffins, waffles or pancakes.

Giving inspires more giving

Brauch-Clougherty, a self-described recycler, who never throws away useful things and hated throwing away excess starter, recently put out word that she had sourdough starter to give. At first it was just friends who came to partake and pick up a small jar (she has the jars!), but then more people heard the call and placed “orders.”

Her front porch has become the delivery center. So far, she has given starter, and simple instructions for bread-making, to over 40 people. “They just keep coming in every day.”

She has watched a community grow. People who receive her starter are so happy they offer her their skills such as handiwork or website building. Brauch-Clougherty doesn’t ask for anything in return, but a woman left her six chicken eggs on her porch. This was helpful because her daughter wanted to make cookies and they were low on eggs. Giving inspires more giving.

It blooms and drops

Starters grow over time.

Pollard feeds his starter every day. “It took two weeks to get it going. It bubbles for a weekend and a half. All of a sudden it turns into four times its original size. It blooms and drops.”

Brauch-Clougherty’s starter has three ingredients, “flour water and salt. And you can skip the salt.” From the time her starter is ready it takes about “five minutes to make the dough” and then she said “it’s about loving it.”

The world
is on fire,
we might
as well
eat bread

Love is indispensable to bread-making.

Pollard’s wife, Courtney Scrabeck, loves having fresh bread in the house and in general he feels that making bread gives people “some comfort.” He added, “The future is so unknown.” His first loaf with his own starter turned out beautifully. He thinks he probably now has too much bread in the house, but “The world is on fire, we might as well eat bread.”

It smelled like beer

Personally, my starter experiment was successful and I created a living blob of sour smelling ooze in a bowl on my kitchen counter. It smelled like beer.

Then I ventured into the bread making portion of this endeavor and made eight simple sourdough rolls. They were gobbled up by my family. I also made pancakes that were flat and tangy. I loved them.

I haven’t hugged my starter at night, but I do love it for the happiness it gives me.

So, what do you need to make homemade bread?

Flour and water

Time and love

It’s as simple as that.