Bread Sticks, Oxen, and Real Bread

Hold your breath a little longer, it’s almost here. Our newest entry into mediocre food and poor service is nearing completion. The out of place Tuscan Villa that was arising in the field across from First Colony had announced itself. The plain stone exterior is now adorned with not one, not two, but three, very large and very yellow signs proclaiming that it is indeed an Olive Garden. Go north, go south, be in front, you can’t escape it. Oh, and for good measure, let’s just put one by the road as well. I’m sure the line of trucks will soon appear with the never ending supply of air bread sticks. Sigh…..

On a happier note, I received my copy of Art Of Eating, the eclectic Edward Behr publication that does in-depth articles on (mostly) little known and out of the way aspects of food from farm to table. I have not finished it yet, having just completed the article on the “Fair of the Fattened Ox” in Carrù, Italy. A centuries old tradition, it determines the most typical ox (sort of like a state fair), who is then paraded through the town and led to the abattoir, slaughtered, butchered and then turned into food for the town. The dish is called “Bollito Misto”, and there are traditional recipes, running several pages. But that’s not what I wanted to mention. The next article is about Pain au Levain, which alert readers will know loosely as Sourdough Bread. No wistful recounting of Cioppino by the Bay, nope this is deep. Here’s a paragraph:

“The yeast and the bacteria aren’t mutually dependent, but they are uniquely suited to sharing the same space. Lactobacillus sanfranciscensis metabolizes the flour’s maltose (after enzymes turn part of the starches into sugars), while Candida Milleri metabolizes other sugars”.

Gives me unpleasant flashbacks to freshman chemistry (which, afterall is pretty much what baking is). Anyway, the history and development of yeast cultures is given pretty much ink, and then there’s an 8 day regimen for making the starter culture from scratch, followed by a 16 hour “build schedule” for the dough, a 7.5 hour “fermentation” schedule involving 20 or so “foldings” of the dough, into the oven, then an hour and twenty minutes later – Boom! You got bread. Whew!!

We’re going up the road this afternoon for some community service kind of training tomorrow morning, and are taking the occasion to meet a friend for dinner. Not exactly sure where yet, maybe a place we’ve been before that’s comfortable and has food suited for the weather. We’ll see..

Oh, for those of you who gutted out the (So called) National Championship game last night, you might have shared my opinion of a lackluster, non-imaginative game. Somehow these “big games” never live up to their hype..

Had a stringer report of a meal in Frederick where the waiter announced himself, then refused to honor a coupon that was a "buy one, get one" type of deal "Oh, that's for more expensive dishes", presented a single diner with a bill that contained an 18% gratuity, and then had the audacity to say "do you need change?". bye bye..

And for no particular reason, here’s what we woke up to this morning…








as we're packing for tonight, we'll make sure we can

DFD