This summer working on the farm at Adamah I’m learning that making things is extremely enjoyable. We are satisfied because it is our hands that have weeded the onions, our milking and washing the jars, and prepping the feed, that brings our milk to our table. No wonder God said “it was good” after every day of creation. God was making things! And having a damn good time.

I offer this as preamble to my latest most exciting project. And while it’s not strictly on the Adamah curriculum, this summer is the first time I’ve found myself to take it on in earnest: bread the ancient way, catching the living yeast in the air….SOURDOUGH!

More specifically, sourdough starter, a bubby frothy sour-smelling concoction I keep in a warm place, feed and stir every so often, and intend to use for a number of tasty experiments.

And what I’m loving, besides the fun of learning something new (and not to mention the fact that this new thing is in fact as ancient and as wise as the entirety of human civilization, which our ancestors until really the last 100 years knew and used), is that I get to talk to people about it.

Many people have ‘always wanted to try” but felt it was a mystery beyond their grasp. To them I say, “I was in your shoes! But I just did it! And that’s all it takes!” And some are in fact well-steeped in sourdough knowledge, and the chance to learn from them has been really exciting.

In particular, our chef’s father, Vern, has been visiting for a while. He’s a longtime maker of sourdough buckwheat pancakes. And I’ve been grateful to learn about sourdough from him.

After lunch the other day I went to feed my starter (it had been going for about 3 days) and it tasted so sour when I licked the spoon that I was really worried. I had already had one batch end in a sordid mess that smelled like cheese….I was anxious not to repeat this!) So I packed up the jar and walked over to the kitchen, and luckily he was there and I held out the jar and said “Help! Is this doing what it’s supposed to?”

He took a look at the light brown goo in my jar, saw the bubbles, gave it a little shake. This looks wonderful, he said. Its perfect. But the sourness? He assured me that that’s what I was going for — it’s called sourdough after all. I told him it was made with rye flour and his eyes lit up. Can we try a little experiment? Vern makes sourdough pancakes using buckwheat flour and buttermilk, and he was interested to see what the rye would taste like. For my part, I was interested in confirming that the bitter sour acid taste I had licked off the spoon was not spores of some invading horrid bacterial army.

So we pancaked! A blob of starter, a little sugar, salt, some baking soda and milk and man! YUM! The really terrible sourness mellowed out into a light rye-bread tinge—and the cakes were really light, almost like crepes, pock-marked with stunning air bubble craters.

I feel so grateful for the pancakes, the starter…but also the conversation. It feels like this kind of “food technology” is not meant to be learned from books. It is oral torah – and the process of sharing it is as sweet as the finished batch!

I’ve just started a sponge, and will bake some loaves tomorrow around lunch time. Once I’ve gotten to know my starter a little better I’ll introduce you – and let you know how to start and maintain it. For now, if you’re interested, check out Wild Fermentation by Sandor Elliot Katz, and this website, which seems to be the most comprehensive online source for sourdough/natural leaven info.