Field Trips and Comfort Food

We are just entering our last week of the Bread 101 course.  After talking quite a lot this term about how wheat is processed into flour, we had the opportunity to take our students to the Camas Country Mill, the first flour mill open in the Willamette Valley since the Great Depression.  Our hosts, Steve and Stephanie, walked us through all the steps of flour production, how and where wheat and other grains are grown, the operation of a stone mill to produce 100% stone ground flours, and the shipping and distribution of the flour.  It was fascinating.  Plus we all got to wear pretty cool hair nets.

We each were sent home with a package of spring spelt flour an ancient grain that can be substituted for wheat flour.  Over the weekend, I used my package to create meals of comfort food.

Saturday Night Pizza
When my daughter was born, my friend Karen brought us calzones with a sausage and Swiss chard filling.  It was a flavor combination that I hadn't had before, but found I really enjoy.  This combination works equally as well as pizza topping.  I used my pizza dough recipe and substituted spelt in a 1:1 ratio for the flour.  I let the dough rise for nearly 2 hours, which is double the typical rising time I allow, and it was perfect.  The dough was easy to roll out, baked nicely, and had a good, strong whole wheat flavor.

The pizza is colorful with the Swiss chard (Groundwork Organics), and combined well with mozzarella cheese, olives, sausage, and tomato sauce.

We ate our pizza with Tusker beer brewed and bottled in Nairobi, Kenya.  Amazing how a taste can be so strongly associated with a place like other foods I ate in Kenya.  Tusker tastes just like I remember.  The cashier at the Bier Stein told me I made a good choice in taking the bottles home.

 

Strawberry Shortcake

Our second agritainment field trip occurred over the weekend to get strawberries. The U-Pick Strawberry field at Thistledown Farm has the best strawberries that I can remember in years!  In less than half and hour we filled our buckets.  We probably should have weighed the kids before and after picking.

But we got lots into our buckets. My daughter was very possessive the bucket she filled.

 

We've made four batches of strawberry freezer jam, will freeze more for the winter, and had strawberry shortcake for breakfast on Sunday.  The biscuits had 1 cup of spelt (Camas Country Mill) and 1 cup soft white wheat (Lonesome Whistle Farm).  The combination created a nice biscuit flavor.  The biscuits were a little crumbly; however, covered in strawberries, whipped cream, and milk this did not matter at all.

I think my whole family has found a new favorite breakfast food.