May at Experienced Goods

By Jennie Reichman ~ If you’ve been reading this column for awhile, you’ve figured out that I love to bake.  Cakes for co-workers’ birthdays, scones for meetings, cookies because, well, cookies.   I‘ve also been trying to cut back on my sugar consumption recently, hoping to maintain, or return to, my (tongue firmly inserted in cheek) girlish figure. How to reconcile the creative pleasure of baking with eating fewer sweet things? In short, bread. Specifically, sourdough bread. In addition to baking treats and bringing them to work for everyone else to eat, I’ve embarked upon a weekly routine of feeding my sourdough starter on Saturday night and baking bread on Sunday. Mind you, I’ve attempted maintaining a sourdough starter before, but I could never figure out when it was actually ready to use.  I would feed it, discard some of it, feed it again, refrigerate it, discard, feed, discard, feed, argh! There was supposed to be some magical moment when it was “ripe” and “vigorous” when I could bake with it, but no recipes I consulted were specific about when that moment should be. Eventually the starter would languish and die in my refrigerator because I ignored it too long and it turned to a brown sludge I had to throw out.  

A couple of months ago, however, my co-worker Emma showed me a TikTok video of a woman gleefully making sourdough bread with a kind of wild, devil-may-care abandon.  Emma loves good bread, and was feeling inspired. She acquired some starter from her fiance’s sister, who told her to essentially just feed the starter a couple of times, leave it out overnight and use it the next day. Emma tried it and made a delicious loaf of bread, which she brought in for all of us to try. “Its so easy!” she said. Before long she was making bread with all kinds of yummy add-ins, like olives, cheese and herbs. “I’ll give you some of my starter,” she told me, and explained her simple feeding-discard-baking-feeding-routine. Huh. Was it really that straightforward? I got my new starter to a point where there was more than enough of it to make bread, and gave Emma’s recipe a try, producing what I would consider a bakery-quality loaf that made my house smell incredible. Plus, maybe best of all, I can put the dough together in the morning (flour, salt, starter, water), fold it over on itself a few times over a period of about two and a half hours, and then leave it to proof on the counter for 6 hours while I go about my usual Sunday routine of grocery shopping and whatever else is on the docket. Now at the end of the day on Saturday when Emma and I ask each other what we are doing over the weekend, we always query, “Baking bread?” “Yup!” “Me too!” I am forever grateful to Emma for breaking the sourdough mystery code for me.  

Bread baking might not be as delightful when summer heat kicks in, however. Picnics, swimming, hiking, gardening, outdoor concerts, laying around in a hammock with a good book, that’s the ticket for the upcoming steamy months. Experienced Goods has you covered if you need clothing, books and housewares for all of these summer delights and more. I am so looking forward to wearing some of my pretty summer dresses in cool linen and cotton. Some of you may know folks who are planning a wedding this summer; we are lucky to have for sale a variety of gorgeous wedding dresses thanks to a generous local donor. Many of these dresses are brand new and quite elaborate, all priced at less than what you might expect to pay for a bottle of champagne.  Going to prom or know someone who is and who doesn’t want to look like a cookie cutter version of everyone else on the dance floor? We have a rack filled with fluff, glitter and elegance, and a few tuxedos, too. And if you are inspired to try your hand at sourdough: bowls, dutch ovens, big jars to grow your starter, and a pep talk from Emma or myself if you need it.

I expect I will still be baking bread this summer despite the heat, but I spied my ice cream maker hiding in the back of a cabinet the other day. I may have to forgo that ban on sugar once in awhile for a bowl of mocha swirl!