House of the Rising Bun.
this co and I go back to freshman year of college, where we lived on the same floor (god bless lallage feazel wall, the only freshman dorm that didn't have nasty communal bathrooms). she's such a great person to talk to about food- you can really tell how much she loves bold flavors and cooking techniques.
we'd eat out together sometimes and a few times cooked together. during sophomore year we had this run where we'd go to this bakery near campus every friday called Breads on Oak. nice people, great desserts- that was the first vegan bakery I'd ever gone to, and I was way beyond impressed. then I came to the stupid realization that desserts are made of mostly sugar anyways, so the other inputs don't really matter as much (don't come after me).
I'll shut up now so you can meet Hannah.
NOW SHOWING
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all subsequent photos, titles, and descriptions credited to hannah.
So when I was a teenager my dad called me "the local swarm of locusts". Now while this did wreck my self-confidence and ruin my relationship with food for several years, he wasn't necessarily wrong, I did eat a lot. But that was partially his fault, he was a really good cook! and so was my mom! One time we made Pastrami from scratch! Trimmed the brisket by hand, cured it for 2 weeks, smoked it for a whole day, the whole nine yards! You can't really blame me for eating 3 reubens a day for a week when that's what was lying around. Honestly I was doomed from the start if you think about it.
Now of course you don't grow up around good cooks without wanting to prove you're a good cook too (or maybe I just have a competitive streak). I started simple in high-school, mostly baking cookies and pies as a way to avoid homework, but college is where I really took off. I tried as many different types of food as I could, and as often as possible I'd try to cook them myself to see if I could do it better (well except for my freshman year when I was mostly ramen cooked in an electric kettle). While I usually couldn't do better than a professional chef (surprise surprise), I did find I'd often make way more food than I could eat myself, forcing me to share with friends (which I guess is nice too). I also got into bread in college. Some how a double major was still easier than keeping my sourdough starter alive longer than a few months.
My favorite cuisines for now are firmly Thai, Sichuan, and Levantine. Though most of what I actually make regularly is bread. If it's not well spiced (or extremely spicy) I won't eat it...
Well, I mean, I will still eat it, swarm of locusts after all. My one exception is the abomination known as the banana-mayonnaise sandwich. My friend from Alabama, in what I'm still convinced is a prank, swears by them. I could hardly keep down a bite before retching, but you do what whatever you need to sustain yourself through medschool Kam
*written content credited to hannah
laWrence of a-grain-ia.
The secret to bread is not letting it smell your fear.
You will be afraid, that's normal, especially if you're just starting out, but you can't let that bowl full of yeasty flour know it. The second your bread detects fear it will end you. It'll deflate before you can even act, and you'll be left crying over a tough, stodgy, overbaked piece of trash questioning how you managed to graduate from college but can't even manage to bake a stupid loaf of bread (ask me how I know).
Once you master your fear, bread's pretty easy honestly. I mean it's literally four ingredients: Flour, Water, Salt, and Yeast. Just mix those together with a rough idea of the right ratios, knead it with all your pent up rage, then let it sit for like 2-4 hours before shaping it and throwing it in the oven. If you wanna get fancy you can add stuff like butter or olive oil or eggs to make different types of bread like challah or foccacia, but I'm not your mom, so I'm not gonna tell you what to do.
Now if you wanna make sourdough bread you're gonna have to not just conquer your fear, but also your pride. Sourdough doesn't give a fuck what you feel about it, it'll kill itself just for the fun of it, just to see you suffer. I've personally murdered 3 sourdough starters in as many years. Art Bakey the first, the second, and the third have all died by my hands when I left them in the fridge too long and forgot to feed them. If you don't do that it should be fine, but expect your first dozen or so loafs to turn out bad. I mean they'll still be amazing, it's homemade sourdough bread, like holy shit even a bad loaf is great, but they won't look nice. I've gotten at most 2 presentable loafs in nearly two dozen attempts. Now you might think that makes me a shit baker, and it might, but you're the one still reading this.
Ultimately Bread making is a great hobby. It takes 10 times the time and effort to make something you could have just grabbed at the store, but it tastes so insanely better and its not like I have anything better to do. Plus a sandwich on homemade bread is literally the best sandwich you'll ever have (as long as it's not one of the banana-mayonnaise sandwiches my friend from Alabama swears by that nearly made me vomit after one bite).
Oh yeah I guess I should probably include a recipe. Shoutout to the sandwich I just ate made with this bread. It only takes like 4 hours to make and is pretty forgiving, as long as you remember: fear is the bread killer.
*written content credited to hannah
A fistful of flour
The last picture dough
*8/24. photos, titles, and descriptions credited to hannah.