Sour Dough

I've rediscovered a lost art... baking from scratch using wild caught yeast!

I started with Youtube, watching as many videos as I could about how to do it. The technique I used was to simply mix some white organic wheat flour together with water to make a runny pancake consistency. Pop this in a jar outside and cover with an old stocking held in place with a lucky band. This is so that yeast will land on the mix from the air. Keep your fingers crossed and discard half each day, replacing with more flour and water and mixing. This is critical as it is fresh food for any new yeast that arrives and keeps conditions right for rapid growth.

Depending on temperature mainly, you should have a good colony going in about 1 week. Keep feeding it at least once per week and don't keep too much of your starter and let it get too big, it works best when it can grow fast and you don't want to use truckloads of flour to achieve this end.

Tonight I've started what I hope will be a tradition. I have milled my own organic rye flour to feed our starter. I used our Thermomix, which was a present from Rodney's mum Helen. Milling my own flour optimises both nutrition and awareness of our food. Grain keeps well and was designed (by nature or God, you decide) to keep. Flour is vulnerable to oxidation of natural oils and is best fresh, particularly whole-grain which includes the 'germ'.

To make a good bread, you need active starter (when it is growing, rather than waiting for you to feed it again) and not too much of it - say ~1/3 cup for a loaf. I like to 'air knead' which is when you oil up your hands and fold and stretch the dough up in the air rather than in a bowl or on a board - where it might stick. If too soft - ie. you pour a runny mix in to bake, it won't dry enough inside to make a proper 'grain' of bread and will be doughy. If too dry, the yeast won't work as well. Add oil to help the bread stay fresh for longer - to reduce trans fat you can use coconut, lard, butter or olive oil (olive may produce a little). There are so many sour-dough recipes, both savoury and sweet.

I pop mine in a silicone baking container and leave to rise on my seedling raising tray overnight - because it keeps it warm. I then bake it in a medium oven and pull it out when it looks right.

Coming at bread making for the third time, I have very much enjoyed it and found that a machine was not necessary although we do have one and for 'normal' / fast bread I'm still happy to use this. Sour dough however, may (I've heard) 'etch' metal - so glass or ceramic is the go when you leave it to rise.

Why cook this way? I am convinced that using microbes in our food is healthy for us. As is the process itself - reconnecting with food as we make it, rather than shovelling it in as fast as possible! ...but back to microbial activity:
- fewer defensive chemicals from the plant itself, in essence pre-digested
- higher protein, lower sugars
- higher nutrition, Vitamins K (several) found in fermented foods
- no 'magic box'... I know where each and every part of my food has come from and how it was made ... not the case for commercial yeast kept in the freezer!

I'm very happy to buy less yeast as well. From time to time we'll go back to the bread machine and bought yeast, but this is primarily for convenience.


I also have a container of wheat flour, a present from my good friend Jess Mess,  and I'm very much looking forward to using this! I think it's not 'bread making' wheat as this is not usually available but I can use it for biscuits and to add the 'whole-meal' taste. I will be keeping my eyes open for other options which might include farmer direct from family friends.

No doubt I'll blog on sour-dough again most likely using my lovely new book on the topic that Rodney bought for me just before he left for Russia :)

Advertising and Sustainability; the way to make sure that the underdog will win

I was lucky enough to secure a seat at the latest Sir Walter Murdoch Memorial Lectures by Todd Sampson on Creativity - balancing fear & success. 

(I got a spot because I responded immediately as part of my strategy to not double-handle emails!)

If you're like me, you might need to look him up if you don't watch much TV! You can see him on the 'Gruen Transfer' show. As a successful advertising executive, he has also been heavily involved with dreaming up 'Earth Hour' which has recently been popular in the less developed world including China (I felt hope bubbling up inside me as I saw the images and almost cried).

He was delightful, wearing a stupid 'Farmville' T-shirt in bright red and casual shoes. The academics introducing him were all wearing very formal wear and were very careful to follow protocol, although I happen to know that they are lovely real people in person. The contrast was stark and I'm sure that he is very conscious of his personal branding - managing it very carefully.

He regaled us with his stories including flying to New Zealand for work and happening to have tea with Sir Edmund Hillary, climbing Mount Everest solo, his pivotal decision to finally become CEO in his firm and about his kids and the importance of parenting encouraging creativity.

He wants us to be courageous enough to take 5 minutes of being creative, rather than choosing to default to some conservative response as a result of fear.

This struck me. In Australia we have numerous examples of environmental problems being ignored or under-funded. Climate change, salinity and systemic forest and woodland declines to name a few close to my heart. We seem reactive and scared. The Carbon Tax has come about as a sort of stop gap after the larger  Emissions Trading Scheme proposed by Kevin Rudd fell through as a result of the leader of the opposition, Malcolm Turnball being displaced in favour of Tony Abbot (the economist in favour direct action and any other random insanity that occurs to him). Something that seemed inevitable with bipartisan support fell apart and the Australian carbon market took a heavy blow... several years later we seem to almost have The Carbon Farming Initiative in place, but that too could fall over before the administrative arms are up and running.

We're settling for less than what my heart tells me is possible.

This concept of creativity trumping fear (at least for 5 minutes) must be embraced by those of us in environmental campaigns as the way to make sure that the underdog will win.

So the question goes out to the ether - "How do we use the creativity often shown in the advertising world for good (rather than evil)?"

"How can we inspire others and change our world?"

Your role can be small, or larger than you could ever imagine :)

Wicking Beds

I've got so many topics I want to blog about! Today I've chosen wicking beds, as I know that my good friend Theo is excited about them and it is very topical as we here in Western Australia are coming into summer.

We will want to design our spring & summer gardens to conserve our scheme (town) water. Did you know that around 50% of our tap water comes from ground water and that we have got forests and woodlands dying from drought? I only recently put two and two together and it has mostly cured me of my desire for long showers. I simply imagine the tree roots sucking on air above the clay bottom of their home aquifer.


The concept of wicking beds is to stop the water from running away and store it in such a way that plants can access it passively. This is in contrast to systems like hydroponics and aquaponics which rely on electricity to keep the water flowing past the plant roots.


There are as many ways to implement a wicking system as there are permaculture designers and practitioners! Speaking of designers, my favourites are Milkwood's Kirsten and Nick -you can see how they made their wicking bed here.


I've got one trial so far and it has worked extremely well. I'm happy to recommend it as possibly one of the easiest ways to grow food in pots.

I started with one of the food grade 5 litre oil containers below (thanks for these Andy!). I find the large size is best for plants to grow vigorously and that they are more productive this way.

I cut off the top to turn it into a pot - easy enough with an angle grinder but some people don't like to use the electricity!  I then cut slots in the base using the angle grinder to allow excess water to drain away, these are up about 5 centimetres from the ground. You can see the bottom has a slight ridge in the centre to allow them to be stacked like this. If you were using another container you can just as easily put the drainage in the side.


The image below is of the finished product with some mint I've successfully grown from seed! Mint seed is tiny, so I'm very happy with this result.

The plants have doubled in the last week or so and are loving the spring weather. They will do better in this pot than any other as they are thirsty!

I'm looking forward to mint with watermelon or apple and cos salad. Yum.!

Here's to simple gardening that is good for us and the earth.

Wild Foods

I get really excited when I see lovely fruit growing over the fences of public spaces. In Perth Western Australia I can get lemons almost all year round, oranges in July-August and perhaps most addictively mulberries in October.

I'm so pleased that last year I took the time to make a few notes to remember where and when... most importantly... to go foraging!

You can see the map of one of my 'stomping grounds' (the places I often visit or spend time in) above. I created this very quickly and easily using Google maps. I made a point of listing the name of the food plant and time of year to visit. In the map above you can see the Lillypilly... an unusual fruit to keep it interesting, although for people who have grown up in Perth they will most likely recognise it. You might know the fruit as 'Chinese Apples'.


At the moment I am very much looking forward to making batches of mulberry jam. Last year we had recently returned from our holiday in Europe and I was very happy spending my spare time gardening and walking in the sunshine. I picked a lot of mulberries when I came across them!

I turned this windfall into jam, jelly or syrup - reserving small quantities of the best perfect fruit to freeze whole for fruit smoothies. Ripe mulberries may need a lot of lemon or store bought pectin (jam setter) to help make a jam, but who wants jam all the time when you can have syrup poured over your yoghurt? Lemon juice and sugar come highly recommended in all cases.

In creating your own wild food map, Google is a great tool to start with and bear in mind that you may be able to build a map with your local community (UK example).

Sustainable Solutions: Favourite Blogs

Sustainable Solutions: Favourite Blogs

I've decided to create a page full of my favourite blogs, for those interested in sustainable solutions. I would love for you to suggest some in the comments and if I become a fan, I'll happily add a fancy image!

Self Regulation

I'm confronted by the desire to manage myself. I'm talking about cycling to work, catching public transport, reducing waste and composting.  

Last week I found myself wasting chicken food I'd gotten for free, it had gotten too old. Some days I drive to work simply because I have woken up too late to get a park at the train station. Worst of all, last night the aquaponics began overflowing due to a build up of healthy plant roots in the grow bed! Luckily I happened to hear the fish jumping and was able to save them!

So I'm not going to beat myself up, which can lead to becoming less motivated to act rather than more! I've decided to treat it as a challenging game, with sophisticated nuances and interesting players (my friends and family).

I begun searching the blog-o-sphere for wisdom. How to get results, set a good example and be happy with my efforts? This is challenging ... so let's make it interesting!

I know that one of the Permaculture originators, David Holmgren, has had some experience with us flawed humans. Check out the diagram below at 4 o'clock!

Source

The bible is full of observations and suggestions about how we manage ourselves so that we do what we know is right. We have been dealing with these issues for most if not all of human history.

In the professional world, the most productive people are highly organised, apply self-regulation and select how they will spend their time to get the most 'bang for their buck'.

So where does that leave me? I feel the answer includes not 'rushing' around. Rather, embracing the idiom - 'a stitch in time saves nine'. In being conscious of myself I can:

• Reduce over-stimulation by computer or TV
• Get enough sleep
• Wake 15 minutes earlier (or more)
• Generate a routine & spend time at home

A routine you say? Years ago, Mum gave my husband the 'hot tip' that I do better with routine... and can do anything within it. It's true; when I was at high school I did 6 high school subjects, no sweat; while at uni I held down two jobs, did full time uni, helped run the Christian union and had a boyfriend. Whew! But I had a routine! At some stage, I lost the routine and it felt like everything was falling apart, including my confidence.

I feel it all comes down to being calm and clear thinking! This allows for effective decision making and a 'balanced' life. As an adult now, I finally 'get' it and have certainly got my confidence back and feel as though I should be able to do almost anything... so back to the routine.

Being deliberately slow in changing my routine will make it easier (see 9 o'clock), I'll begin by tweaking my schedule as follows:

• The mornings of my days off will be treats for the chickens with blended fruit we haven't eaten or greens 'weeds' from the garden. I should enjoy this process!
• 2 minutes of aquaponics cleaning on a Saturday morning - risk management!
• Bins and composting on Tuesday nights (before rubbish pick up the next day)

I trust I will find myself living with more integrity and that I will be better equipped to make a difference in our world.

Over and out