Friday, June 05, 2009

I Have an Odd Sence of Humor

For the record, I didn't knit even a single stitch today, and I don't like the way it makes me feel. I don't like being so busy I can't find half an hour to get in a couple of rows. So I don't think I'll do this again.


Food is very important to me. I cook most of our meals from scratch, believing, as I do, that processed foods -- while not poison -- are not wholesome. I make my own soups. I can my own preserves. I try to explain to Norbert how food is grown, and I try to give him a connection to the food because I think that if you know how and where it is grown, you are less likely to waste it.

I particularly enjoy baking my own bread. Especially challah, the bread traditionally eaten by Eastern European Jews as part of the sabbath meal. It is a dough rich with egg and oil, braided and risen and topped with poppy seed or sesame seeds, or my own creation -- and my favorite -- with salt & pepper.

Knowing what you now know about the importance I place on food and my bread baking proclivities, you won't be surprised to learn that I buy my flour in 50 lb. bags.


A couple of times a year I drive to Shipshewana, Indiana to buy a car load of supplies. A few bags of bread flour, a few pounds of yeast. I do this because I like the fact that the wheat is grown in Indiana by Amish farmers known by the store owner. The wheat is milled in the next town over. Again, by someone known to the community. And it is then sold in the community.

And I never buy New Rinkel flour without getting a jolly.

Now why, you may ask, does this amuse me? My Jewish posse will see it right away.


This last picture has nothing to do with anything, except that my grandmother, z"l, always had a few African violet plants sitting in saucers in a north-facing dining room window. And they brought her a great deal of joy when they bloomed. Last year at the end of June I bought a few African violets on sale a t Jewel. And I lovingly tended them through the winter. And I was rewarded with this.

The picture looks blue, but the posies are more accurately purple. I happen to LOVE purple flowers. As Miss Shug once said, "I think it pisses God off when you walk by the color purple in a field and don't notice it. " So I try to notice it every chance I get.

Have a lovely weekend.

1 comment:

Sonya said...

I was just scrolling through my knitting blogs and there's my hometown flour company! I grew up in Howe and my high school boyfriend's house was about a mile from the mill. I think I take for granted how much local food is available in my area.