Because it's worth the research

I bake. I bake things, not myself. Although August in Saskatchewan...yes, sometimes people themselves bake but that's another story.

I bake when: I'm happy, angry, sad, tired, frustrated, excited - in fact I think the only thing that baking doesn't make better is migraines. But who knows? I've never tried baking with a migraine; perhaps I'm missing out on the most productive cure ever.

Oops - way off track. Anyway, when a friend's life had to change drastically, I threw myself into doing something about it. Lots of experiments and lots of research.

Lots of reading, too. I've learned about things that are interesting in their own right (Like Britain's 1953 flour order), and things that I am hoping will help me in my quest. Things from other countries, sometimes in English, sometimes in languages that I can read and sometimes in languages that I have to find someone to help me out with. Which in itself has made me want to learn Arabic.

Drat - off topic again. I figured if I went back in time (oh, I really wish I could mean that literally) I would have a much better understanding of what I am trying to accomplish. So I read books from the early 1900's. Not good enough. So I went back a hundred years. Still not good enough. How far back did I go? Fifteen hundreds. Very helpful, if difficult to get trhough at times. Very helpful, though, and there were occasionally words that a) I didn't understand until I looked them up and b) should come back into circulation because they're awesome.

For your reading pleasure here is a bit from Thomas Muffet's Health's Improvement. Written @ 1595, published in 1655 by Samuel Thomson at the Sign of the White Horse in St. Paul's Churchyard:

"the water must be pure, from a clear river or spring" (HA! Don't even think about trying that today), the salt must ve very white, finely beaten, not too much nor too little , but to give an indifferent seasoning. The leaven must be made of pure wheate, it must not be too old least it prove too soure, nor too new least it work to no purpose. When a just proportion is kept betwixt them both Leaven corrects the meals imperfection, making altogether a well relished mass called Bread which is justly termed the staff of life...loaves made of pure wheaten-meal require both more leaven and more labouring, and more baking , than either coarse cheate or than bread mingled of meal and grudgins".

Seriously, shouldn't we start using grudgins again? Ok, they're just the coarsest particlles of husk and bran but still - I'd like to say "grudgins" the next time someone asks me what I had for breakfast.