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Bread, wheat berries and loaf pans (Q1, 2020)
We bought a Vitamix during Black Friday and after a bit of experimentation we’ve settled into a very good routine with the bread.
The basic ratio for soaking the wheat berries is 160% water (for winter red wheat, less for white). I also learned that I need to let it soak for a while. Definitely more than a couple hours (learned that the hard way) but it seems to work pretty good by the time you hit twelve hours.
During Black Friday we also bought a cast iron loaf pan. That allowed us to play with much wetter mixes than I had previously done, since shaping was no longer a limiting factor, I believe that I may had gotten up to 110% hydration on one loaf.
After playing around with different ratios of wheat berries to white flour, we ultimately decided that a 50/50 split was the tastiest option.
150g wheat berries all purpose flour
240g water (soak)
150g flour
150g starter
±3g saltThis base recipe results in an 80% hydration loaf, which is well in line with my round loaves. However, we’ve stuck with the loaf pan, primarily because it has been nice to bake in the toaster oven, saving us the hassle of taking everything outside the big oven.
To minimize waste, I’ll rinse out the vitamix into the starter. And if I put in a little too much water, I’ll take some of that water and use it for the dough, up to about 100% hydration.
In general this is working wonderfully, I strongly recommend trying this wet grind method. No need for a dry grinder, and no dusty mess.
The next step is to start throwing some odd grains into the mix and see what happens!
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Where to put the “tired”?
Seth Godin has a riff about about running marathons. It’s not about whether you’re tired or not, it’s about where you put the “tired”. Those who can dance with the tired are the ones who can finish the race.
In this time of insanity, I’ve been living in an odd island of solitude. Due to a nicely timed departure by my in-law’s tenant, I got moved into a separate house as I kept working out in the world. So unlike the rest of America, my quarantine has been without the kids.
First off, this sucks.. I’d much rather be with them than to live vicariously on Facetime and Zoom.
But I can also acknowledge there is a silver lining. I have rediscovered the privilege of living as a single person, with the relative free time such a lifestyle entails.
Even so I still got my job and I still get tired. It has been long days at the office, even if the commute is just across the bedroom to the desk. And when I’m tired, but I don’t got to take care of the kids…where do I put the tired?
I’m not cocky enough to think this is the time to learn something new or do something great.
But I decided that (unless I’m reading or sleeping) I should at least type something up here on this blog before I truly veg out.
So here it is.
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Innovation, Carl Chudyk, 2010
I consider Carl Chudyk a minor diety in gaming. Of all his games, the one I have come to love the most is Innovation.
I had a rotten introduction to the game, a 2v2 team game where it just seemed utterly uncontrolled random and chaotic.
Which as any Chudyk enthusiast would recognize is pretty standard impression by the uninitiated.
The second time wasn’t much better, a 5 player game with one of the expansions. Even now I couldn’t recommend such an experience.
So I just ignored the game for a few years until I listened to an in-depth podcast extolling its virtues. I also had come to know too many respected gamers who spoke highly of the game. And by then, I had also finally come around to enjoying his other classic, Glory to Rome.
So I bought myself a copy and the third time was indeed the charm.
Chudyk excels at creating games with tight tactical play masked in a sea of seeming chaos. His games can require high skill to consistently play well, but the outrageousness of his card combos result the appearance of blind randomness.
There are a lot of moving part to keep track of. It is cards, but it isn’t random. Chudyk gives you a lot of levers to dance with the crazy. All this takes a moment to grok.
And when you do, it becomes beautiful.
Once you know the landscape, moments of brilliant tactical play reveal themselves. Surprise and delight await you around the corner.
Or sometimes you draw badly, and frustration gurgles in your chest as the draw hinder your progress.
But experienced Chudyk fans would note, somehow it is the n00bs who always end up in an extended run of useless cards.
There’s an awful lot of game here. You just need to learn to go with the flow. Of course, you will plan ahead. But the beauty of the game is found when you’re forced to change your plans. The fun starts when your well laid plan falls apart one turn later.
It is not easy to thrive in this chaos. But if you enjoy such a challenge, Innovation gives you both in spades.
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Walking the site
Last week I spent a moment walking the job site.
Doesn’t sound like much, but this was a new experience for me.
In the past I’ve always been the architect, so I was escorted by the contractor as we walked the project. But now I am the Owner, so the contractor told me to enjoy my stroll and went back to their work.
Walking the site by myself was an unexpectedly contemplative activity. It’s just starting. The building pad has been set with a few of the footings poured. Rebar sticking up everywhere. There were a few earthwork guys in massive machines scraping down the new parking lot to get it open in a few weeks, a year before the main building is completed.
As an architect you live in a world of paper. More accurately you live in the computer, flying through the model space of your building information model. Even though I’m no longer practicing, being the owner isn’t much different except for the pesky financial spreadsheets that now take my attention before those plans and drawings.
Either way, I’ve been in paper space for the last twenty months since I joined the state public works division.
But now, here is 12 acres of disturbed land that was parking lot and desert a mere three months ago.
Dirt, rock, concrete, steel. Spray paint, stringlines, mushroom caps, formboards.
In eighteen months, this will be a new building, filled with college students earning a degree, kids at the daycare, professors crafting their lesson plans, speech pathologists honing their craft.
In eighteen months, the roll of papers that will have been my companions for three years will be frozen in storage, an archive of yesterday’s efforts.
And the men and women currently buzzing around this jobsite trailer will have moved onto another patch of desert, materializing the dreams of another owner, a different architect, another group of users.
