Julie and Julia

Went to see Julie and Julia last night. LOVED it! Really inspired you to cook and blog and so here I am. Not much bread inspiration provided per se. In fact you only see her (both hers) buying bread, not baking it. I think it might be time for me to try making Jan's bread. But now I can't find the recipe. Anyone know where I can find it...

Cruel Twist of Fate

It's been so long since I've been baking bread that I have had much of anything to bread blog about. But I have been continuing to see my Dad weekly. We have a routine now that goes... arrive in time for lunch at the Freedom Village lunch counter, short financial discussion or dr's visit, grocery shopping, and dinner at a suburban chain restaurant then drive home. The restaurant thing is a bit of a negotiation each time but we seem to be in a rotation of Carrabas, Outback, and Bonefish. I think they may even all be owned by the same chain.

So this week Outback came back up to the top of the list again. Anyone eaten there? Remember their bread? Know where this story is going? For those of you who have sworn off chain restaurants, Outback serves a signature loaf of warm dark brown bread.

After a semi-painful dinner in which my Dad sent almost everything back to the kitchen and then didn't really eat much of the newly perfected dish, we of course asked for a box to take the rest home. As I'm boxing up the steak my Dad says "oh and put the bread in there too." "Oh, you like this bread do you?"

I couldn't resist. I confronted him about not liking my bread. He feigned lack of memory. Or said he didn't remember it that way. Or something. The conversation concluded with my Dad declaring that "it was a long time ago". Gah!

Well I'm still not making him bread, but now I'm mad I let that stop me from being enthusiastic about my bread baking. Now excuse me, I have to go bake some bread. And it's not pumpernickel.

Acceptance

Ugh. I guess I've finally accepted that making food for my Dad really may not ever be something he will enjoy. I think Jen's right about nonagenarians. But it makes me a little sad.

So I think I'll keep baking for me. Try to find an everyday multi-grain bread recipe I can adopt. And if I really need an enthusiastic audience, I'll try out the recipes in the 'baking for dogs' chapter. I'm not sure it's possible to bake something bad enough to be rejected by Maisy. After all, she joyously eats stale bread off the sidewalk after it's been stepped on by tourists and turned into mush by the rain.

And I will admit that I kind of like blogging. I could stand a little more interactivity though. :) I guess we'll just go with a slightly more random selection of topics. But still a good dose of bread as I try to follow my own bread path towards something other than pumpernickel.

Denouement?

I was chatting with Jan last night and she asked how the bread project from the weekend went. The bread turned out great. But the reaction I got from my Dad was roughly "i don't want any bread".

Ok, so he didn't exactly say I don't want any bread, but that's what he meant. It was more like "i don't really eat much bread". This was after I had pretty much forced him to taste the bread. There was also a very obligatory sounding "very good". My Dad is nothing if not polite. :)

So I promised Jan a little self-analysis on the blog, since it seems clear that my making bread for Dad only appeals to one of us. And it really was very well intentioned. And I did learn how to bake bread (for the most part). And I still have the impulse to bring him a little something homemade when I visit each week. I guess I should just accept that it's at least 50% for me. There's not much else I can do for him that gives us both a little enjoyment. While taking him to the Dr. is very useful, it's not super fun.

That places us squarely at the "and what now?' point of this project. I see three options:
Option 1- keep going on bread making for myself and search for a recipe and routine that can create my everyday bread.
Option 2- start exploring stuff to make for my dad that he'd actually receive enthusiastically.
Option 3- The END

Really they're all independent decisions in some way. Could do options 1 and 2 but stop blogging. Could end the bread baking and focus my energy on proteins that travel and reheat well. (I jokingly suggested homemade gefilte fish. Do not joke about this with a NY Jew. It leads to disappointment.) Could give up on the idea that taking my Dad food is useful. Could keep blogging on option 1 or 2 and silently pursue the other.

LOVE some feedback! Worth keeping the blog going? (hello silent readers...) If so, keep bread as the theme or follow the "feeding Dad" path? Or bail on the blog and keep plugging away at feeding Dad? Just become a personal baker? Your thoughts?

The Moment

I've been gone from the bread blog for a while, but now's the moment to return to bread baking. Starting up a new consulting practice has been a little consuming, but I think I've got it under control. Now I go to visit my Dad on Mondays, and work from home when I need to otherwise. This would seem to point towards Sunday bread baking.

So tomorrow's going to be the moment in which I attempt to make good on the mission of Towards Pumpernickel and deliver a loaf of black bread to my Dad. And it's the beginning of new efforts towards integrating bread baking into a life routine. I was away from bread baking long enough that I needed to buy some commercial bread and it just seemed wrong.

Today I'm going to make the bread start to finish. Ideally I'd like to try baking the shaped loaf on Monday morning before I go. But I don't think I'll start there. I want to know I'll have a loaf to take with me. Now entering, Towards Pumpernickel stage 3.

Validation

Yup, my take on the 3rd try has been validated.
From Davina... "The breat is AMAZING--just perfect! Yay! "
See, I didn't even fix the typo. :)

Going to see Dad on Monday. I will definitely make the bread on Sunday night. True test!

Third Time's a Charm!

Russian black bread #3 is now in the record books. Received (by me) with much fanfare. Old adage "third time's a charm" is now confirmed. (or "third time lucky" for you Brits)

Made the recipe using All Bran cereal instead of straight wheat bran. Perfect middle ground between the prior two recipes. Finally got the right texture. And no extra bran in the teeth afterwards! I thought maybe the sugar in the cereal would make the bread sweet. Not at all. It just perfectly rounded out the flavor. I don't personally think of russian black bread as a favorite, but I really like this. Have we arrived "At Pumpernickel"? Hmmm....

The bread fairy has done her work. We'll have to see if Davina agrees.