Tuesday, 1/11, brought a slight improvement, enough for us to trek to the orphanage. As nice as a day it was, the kids were inside, some doing homework some being devious. We helped a young, brother and sister with their math homework. We colored different shapes different colors--red, brown, blue, green, yellow, purple. Then I helped the girl find, color, and count the axis, vertices, and angles for a triangle, square, and rectangle. The boy's older sister took his homework and filled in that part before Andy got a chance to do it with him. But he confirmed my answers, that the axis, vertices, and angles should all be the same number. The tia left for five minutes, and seeing as we have zero authority, the majority of the kids got into a baby powder fight. When Andy wrangled one bottle away, they called him bad. When I got possession of it, a twelve-year old boy climbed all over my back trying to rip it from my hands. Not to worry, their fun was not ruined, they just found another bottle, albeit smaller. At least it smelled good. They also took their freshly laundered sheets and used them to drag each other down the hall. The worst was discovering that two boys held down one of the oldest special needs individuals and colored in dark green and blue marker all over his face. It wasn't just lines, it was a no-inch-spared mask that extended to his ears and into the inner corners of his eyes. He was hysterical. When the tia came back, we were standing in front of the door with this individual wrapped around my waist sobbing, holding on to Andy's arm on the other side. The tia sent a girl to fetch the social worker. The tia explained to her, "I was gone for five minutes." Needless to say, we can feel a bit useless. We spent the rest of the time sitting on the couch with the individual rubbing his back and what not.
Wednesday, 1/12, we planned to stay home. We made bread and went to the movies.
Yum.
Also, in addition to celebrating with lots of clowns, this country has a lot of random parades with thirty members or less, but always a band. We think this one was for Epiphany.
This one too.
Friday, 1/14, more bread. This loaf included some barley flour. It was delicious.
Saturday, 1/15, more bread. Andy let me try to score it.
The dough, pretty before the oven.
A little blurry, but beautiful! This loaf contained some cooked oats and oat flour.
It was the weekend, so why not make two? French bread, anyone?
Don't they look nice together? Sorry I'm apparently not so good at holding a camera.
Sunday, 1/16, my brother Max turned twenty-one. Happy Birthday Max!
He helped carry-in from the snow a calf that had been born on his girlfriend's family farm. He has an album aptly named, There's a Calf in the Kitchen.
Also, much to our jealously, he has been capturing the ceaseless winter storms in New England. Enjoy some of his snowy-scenes and fun-frolics in Connecticut. All photos are courtesy of Max T. Beitel Photography.
Our friend Kevin's family dog.
Kevin in the woods.
Sunday morning I woke up in a marvelous mood, so we skipped church, which has the tendency to make me grumpy after nearly three hours of service, and well, ate bread.
Monday, 1/17, we made bread, but not just any bread, sourdough bread. For over a week, Andy tended to his sourdough starter as it collected wild yeast. You will note a cookie sheet in this picture. We had been baking the bread on tin-foil, which prevented the bottom from browning, and sometimes, even cooking. So we splurged on a cookie sheet.
Not too shabby for our first sourdough. I say our, but really, it's all Andy.
Yet, when we examined the loaf, we realized that although the bottom of the bread had cooked on the cookie sheet, so too had the cookie sheet cooked on the bread. Even the areas that don't look like they had a run in with a spaceship or silver spray paint were glittery. We cut the bottom off on each slice. Bummer.
The crumb, however, was perfect.
Oh yes, and I made peanut butter blondies with chocolate frosting. Except, I never wait long enough for the bar to cool and rarely make stiff enough frosting, so it's a little melty looking, but it stayed on just great. Oh, and that hole in the middle? Let's just say we don't have any toothpicks.
Tuesday, 1/18, Happy Birthday Mom! In case you haven't noticed, January is a big birthday month for my family. Here is one of my favorite shots of Mom and my brother Christian. Photo by Max T. Beitel.
Wednesday, 1/19, we made this enormous beauty. It proofed a bit too long, but turned out quite alright.
More than alright, actually, deliciously. It was a little bit of everything loaf, but was primarily flavored by cooked quinoa and quinoa flour.
Wednesday was a big day for us. We went shopping at AKI, the close(ish) grocery store. We went to the mall and saw the movie Tangled, dubbed in Spanish. We then hit Mega Maxi for other items. One item we could not find at AKI and traditionally found at Mega Maxi, was brown sugar. No luck. Where the brown sugar is stocked, organic cane juice solidified was in its place for nearly twice the cost. We've deduced that there is a brown sugar shortage in the country. Our morning oatmeal and cookie dough will suffer until it returns, which we sincerely hope it does soon.
In other news, we discovered the other week that I have single-handedly, my right hand if you're wondering, eaten 8 kg of white sugar, plain and in various recipes, all before we even found oven access. That's um, 17.6 lbs of white sugar according to my googled conversion. I don't really think it's possible, but Andy swears he only uses brown sugar. We don't have a scale, but I'm pretty sure sugar, stress, and poor-sleep all cancel each other out, but because you might not believe that, I'll take visual evidence that I still have cheek-bones. Actually, you'll just have to take my word for it or not believe me; I don't really care which. Also, Andy informs me that we're, okay I'm, half-way done with another 2 kg, making my total 10 kg of white sugar consumption in three months. That seems so crazy to me it is having little preventative impact. Andy says I ate that much in the States. I never had actual proof of it. There were always other people around to help eat what I made. What really puzzles me, is that, like Andy, I prefer brown sugar to white sugar, and usually put more of that in my recipes.
Another observation, flour is very expensive down here. It is roughly $3.00 for a 2 kg bag. Between cookie dough and bread making we go through at least 4 kg a week. In the States, I tended to think of sugar and flour as the cheap ingredients. Not so down here. The plus side is that vegetables are the most inexpensive items to buy, e.g. a head of broccoli for thirty-four cents or a small bag of pre-cubed butternut squash for fifty-five cents. Most vegetables at least, mushrooms, for example are quite pricey. Other food items, like bacon or sausage, and home supplies, like toilet paper and dish soap, are extremely expensive. Besides flour and meat, our biggest budget buster is butter. I couldn't resist the alliteration, sorry. It may be bad for the body and weighty for the wallet, but we are not deterred. Our copious consumption remains. Have I made the following claim before? Butter and bacon make everything better.
Speaking of butter, what could go better with homemade bread than homemade butter? Olive oil and salt or some jam, perhaps, but the point is, we made homemade butter. We bought the cream, we cleaned out an empty jam jar, and we shook—a lot. I spilled on the floor, myself, and Andy, obviously, but it was exciting and a fun little project. While were on the subject of cream, my thoughts jump from food to food, it is yummy. I grew up drinking skim milk, but I drink lots of whole milk down here. It is cheaper than skim milk by a few cents, but Andy says it is two times cheaper because we could add water to the carton of milk to produce two cartons of skim milk. I don't mind because it tastes good. Cream tastes even better, though.
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