Care and Use Instructions (or: "It Broke")

I recently received the stunning gift of a beautiful bright-green Le Creuset Cookware Set. I had baked my last loaves of No-Knead Bread with my Dad's older 7-qt Le Creuset dutch oven, so naturally I was eager to christen the Dutch oven in this new set with another batch of bread.

Well, last night I was reading the little booklet that came with my set, and noticed that the black phenolic knob on the lid was only oven-proof to 375 degrees. "Hmm..." I thought. "The NYT No-Knead Bread recipe is so popular, that surely many people have been able to use these pots at 450 degrees with no problems, and I've been able to use my older pot with no problems... so, eh, it'll be fine."

As you can probably guess... it was not fine. The knob was loose after taking the lid out of the oven 30 minutes later, and while nervously trying to screw it back on, the knob chipped right at the base, and I realized that my beautiful little brand-new pot was busted.

After several hours of panicking and fretting, a late night web search directed me to several wholesalers who sell Le Creuset pot knobs: not only the replacement black phenolic knobs, but hardcore, sure-thing, 100% heatproof stainless steel knobs, at just $10 a pop. Most dealers only sell one or the other, but I found this handy dealer who sells both: IraWoods.com. Here are the links for the Le Creuset Stainless Steel Knob and Large Phenolic Knob.

What really made me feel better during this web search was discovering that I wasn't the only dummy out there, stubbornly destroying her perfect cookware. It turns out that after the New York Times published the Mark Bittman No-Knead Bread recipe back in Nov. 2006, so many folks damaged their LC knobs that people took to stealing knobs from display models at department stores: see article Knob Heads: No Knead Bread Update.

So, the moral of this story is: when you receive a lovely and valuable gift, always read (and believe) the Care and Use Instructions, to ensure the gift stays lovely and valuable.

But don't feel so bad if you do mess up: a lot of people out there are just as stupid as you are, and are more than happy to blog about their mistakes.

Inspiration from Lizzie

Okay... here I go again. Back from so many months. After reading some blogs of my friends this morning, especially my friend Lizzie's, I realize how much fun it is to share stories with others. I'm really going to try to stop neglecting this blog as much as I've been in the past, and try to get in the habit of writing (hopefully) once a week.

The main topic of this blog will be my introduction to the New York Times' No-Knead Bread by Lizzie.

This bread is amazing. I had never tried baking my own bread before this recipe, figuring that it would just be too hard, or I'd mess it up, but mostly because any recipe I had ever read of home-made bread seemed to go on for about 3 pages or 25 steps, whichever came first, and my eyes would glaze over, and before I finished reading it, I'd start wondering if there was a checkbook that needed balancing, or some drying paint nearby that needed watching.

Anyway, so I was chatting with Lizzie one Sunday afternoon, and she gave me this recipe:


No-Knead Bread
Adapted from Jim Lahey, Sullivan Street Bakery
and then adapted from Lizzie

•3 cups bread flour: I like 2½ cup unbleached white and ½ cup whole wheat
•¼ teaspoon active dry yeast
•1-5/8 cup lukewarm water: about 110 degrees
•1 ½ to 2 teaspoons salt
•¼ cup wheat germ (optional)
•Cornmeal or wheat bran as needed

1. In a small bowl combine warm water and yeast. Set aside for about 10 minutes.

2. In a large bowl combine flour, salt and wheat germ. Add water-yeast mixture, and stir all ingredients until blended; dough will be shaggy and sticky. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest at least 12 hours, preferably about 18 to 20, at warm room temperature, about 70 degrees.

3. Dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles. Lightly flour a work surface and place dough on it; sprinkle it with a little more flour and fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest about 15 minutes.

4. Using just enough flour to keep dough from sticking to work surface or to your fingers, gently and quickly shape dough into a ball. Generously coat a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with flour, wheat bran or cornmeal; put dough seam side down on towel and dust with more flour, bran or cornmeal. Cover with another cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours. When it is ready, dough will be more than double in size and will not readily spring back when poked with a finger.

5. At least a half-hour before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees. Put a 5- to 8-quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, Pyrex or ceramic) in oven as it heats. When dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide your hand under towel and turn dough over into pot, seam side up; it may look like a mess, but that is okay. Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes. Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes, until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on a rack.

Yield: One 1½-pound loaf.
Time: About 1½ hours prep and baking, plus 14 to 22 hours’ rising



The first time I made this, I got the water amount wrong by about a cup (I blame cell phones), and over-improvised with too much water, so it didn't turn out that great. But then... I made my second loaf, and I was so freaked-out by the results that I had to grab my camera and show it off to everyone:


The crust: crispy, hard, and actually crackling: I guess a reaction between the heat and the corn meal


The longest hour later: the first slice, stretchy and chewy, complete with perfect air bubbles. I have a feeling this feature might be a unique result of living in the humid climate of the SF Bay Area, but either way, the bread is marvelous.

Since I learned about this recipe on the 25th, I have baked about 8 loaves of bread. The thing I love most about this recipe is that no two loaves look alike, but they all taste equally amazing.

Thank you Lizzie! Next up: those coffee cupcakes. I have to say, those looked pretty good indeed.

Such a long time such a long time such a long lonely lonely lonely lonely lonely time...

Well, it hasn't really been a lonely time, I just like that song.

But it HAS been a long time since I posted my last blog. EEK! I blame it all on Facebook.

Okay, so here's what I've been doing for the past 5 months:

1. Drawing!! I switched figure drawing classes a couple months ago, and am now studying with Michael Markowitz, an artist at the 23rd Street Art Gallery in Noe Valley. Here's my link to the Flickr page with some favorite pieces from both his class, and my previous class with Linda Corbett at Palo Alto's Pacific Art League: My Figure Drawing Set on Flickr

And here are my big faves:



9/23/08, 23rd St. Gallery, 1-hr pose; conté crayon, pastel, charcoal



10/06/08, 23rd St. Gallery, 2-min gesture; charcoal



10/06/08, 23rd St. Gallery, 7-min pose; charcoal



10/06/08, 23rd St. Gallery, 1-hr pose; pastel, conté crayon, charcoal


2. Reading: Mostly thanks to Caltrain, I've had my nose stuck in some pretty great books lately. My most recent amazing read is The Blind Assassin, by Margaret Atwood. This book was my introduction to Atwood, and I am completely hooked. As soon as I was finished with Assassin, I went out and bought another Atwood novel, Alias Grace. After a somewhat slower start than Assassin, this one is proving to be just as engaging. Also on the "Recently Read" shelf: Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides. Absolutely LOVED it. On the nonfiction side: Don't Get Too Comfortable, by David Rakoff and When You Are Engulfed in Flames, by David Sedaris. Both were very funny books from reliably hysterical writers.

3. Biking! Recently my boss at WPI set up a ride from Mill Valley to Mount Tam with the Obama-centric theme of "YES WE TAM!" This is the JPG of the email invitation he sent out to announce the ride:



Here's the album with pics from the ride on my Facebook Page: Yes we TAM! Bike Ride

By the way, while we're on the subject of Obama, let's all vote on Tuesday, mmkay?


4. Visiting my Family: James and I went to visit my sister this past weekend in Colorado Springs, and then took them all down for a roadtrip to celebrate my Grandpa Tom's 80th birthday in Albuquerque. Charity has the most adorable kids I've ever seen, and deserves a medal for raising them so well while her husband's been away for most of the last 5 years in Iraq. Here are Gibson, almost 9; Jonathan, 7; Conner, 4; and baby girl Sydney, 8 mo:

My Sister's Great Kids

That's about it. Also on this list would be: moving with James to a cute place in Belmont, listening to and watching the debates, becoming addicted to This American Life podcasts, getting deeply involved in the political goings-on of Getting More Bike Capacity on Caltrain, and, most recently, pumpkin carving:



I hope everyone else has been just swell. I promise I'll be back soon!

Where the Hell is Matt?

My Mom sent me this link, and she NEVER sends me forwards or links (or very rarely sends them, anyway), so I figured it had to be good. I was correct:


Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

Because I'm not made of wood, I was sitting there with tears rolling down my face by the end of it. Wasn't that good??

My blog has been taken over by "FakeDomain.com"

Has this ever happened to anyone else? This is what my blog address re-directs to.

Life on a bike

So, on tax day last month, I was given the unexpected and delightful gift of a fabulous new bike! (to be exact, a 2007 Fuji Absolute LX silver hybrid.)

I was slightly intimidated at first, because I had almost never ridden a bike in my adult life (I think a total of 5 rides, from the time I was 16 until now). But I've gotten the hang of it: riding in traffic, going up hills, wearing clipless pedals (after falling over in front of traffic at red lights only about 7 times), and all; and I absolutely love riding on a bike.

This bike has really changed the way I think about exercising, the concept of fun, driving, getting around, and freedom. It is awesome. And, at the end of the year, it will make me a bit richer: My boss, who is an avid rider, has an employee "health incentives plan" of forking over $0.10/mile to a biking employee at the end of each year. Well, 28 days later, I've earned $19.45! (and that includes one week that she was busted in the shop (we won't talk about why.))

I've decided that it's worth my while, time-wise, stress-wise, health-wise and air-wise (and just about breaking even cost-wise, comparing a long and somewhat expensive train ride with the outrageous cost of Bay Area fuel), to ride my bike to Caltrain and take the train into work. It's a short bike ride to and from the station from my house to work, but at the end of the day, I can get off a few stops early and go for a nice, long twilight ride before coming home (and burn like 500 calories(!) at the same time, which makes for a much more satisfying workout than sweating on the elliptical machine for 30 minutes at the gym).

So here are some pics of me and my new baby:


On one of my first rides, to Peet's.



Taking a break on one of many trails in the hills around my house.



Looking ahead on the bike path. I absolutely ADORE these trails!



If you ever needed a reason to start biking, this would be it.

Figure Drawing Class: First day at school

YAAY! Just got back from very first drawing class since 2002. Hoorah! I heard about this 10-week class from a woman I talked to a couple of weeks ago about art classes. She suggested this school in Palo Alto because they offer classes with models, which was always my favorite part of art school. Am lucky enough to have WPI foot the bill for my "continuing education." Have never been so giddy about going back to school!

I took some pics of the best work from tonight. Class started with warmup of ten 10-second and ten 30-second poses, then on to some minute-longs, and then some longer poses. Class was small, about 4 or 5 total, and had really great easels. (UGA never was blessed with good easels in its painting department: they had precarious metal frames, with oil-paint-coated hinges, and on several occasions they collapsed onto some poor student during my classes. My painting teachers were always very bitter about the huge percentage of the art school budget that was typically given over to the tech-heavy design school. Anyway, these easels were great.)

I discovered that I couldn't quite remember how to use white conte crayons: more than once, I destroyed a couple of drawings by smearing in some white too soon. But these were the best:


10-second pose



10-second pose



30-second pose



30-second pose



first part of a longer pose: about 30 minutes



long pose: about an hour total. This one was very tough, but I stuck with it. It looks strangely proportioned, but there's still a kind of tense, uncomfortable energy I like about it.

More to come next week!!