Day 5 on the Blueberry Farm

I don’t enjoy doing things I’m bad at, so that means hand milking is not my favorite activity. Vickie is so patient to allow someone like me to milk her twice a day because getting anything out is a struggle.  My hands are not yet strong enough, and I don’t have the proper form because it’s still unnatural, so the process gets dragged out.  I think cows are going to be the bane of me yet.  Berry picking, on the other hand, is an activity I enjoy.  I have hours to be alone with my thoughts and pick the ripe red currents growing on the bushes.  I spent four hours filling buckets full today before lunch.  After lunch, I had the opportunity to help and observe Yvonne make homemade yeast bread and homemade cheese.  Both were more complicated than Yvonne let on, and they took the entire afternoon to complete.  Granted, the processes are routine for her at this point, but I still found them to be more time consuming than I anticipated.  She also made enough for a family of five plus me and other visitors, such as five loaves of bread and a batch of biscuits, whereas I would only make one loaf of bread if I were repeating the recipe.  As the cheese process was so extensive and not yet complete, I’m going to wait to post the information concerning the cheese making methodology, but I am going to share the bread recipe at the end of this post.  Other than learning how to make cheese and bread, I also had the opportunity to bottle feed Harry the lamb.  He was such an excited slurper that I could hardly keep up and almost choked him several times.  It didn’t help that the dogs were both trying to get in on the action as well.  After feeding Harry, I then got to suckle bucket feed whey to Ramona the calf.  She was a little less sporadic but equally as excited for the yummy treat.  I absolutely love baby animals.  For dinner we ate red currant pancakes made from the red currants I’ve been dedicated to picking, and Sigi even made me a special heart pancake per my request.  It was a fantastic day, and tomorrow we’re getting two families visiting the farm for tours.  My job is to be part of the tour groups and experience everything a tour group experiences so that I am able to write about my thoughts and first impressions for the Blueberry Hill Farm.  I hope there are more baby animals involved. 

Yeast Bread (Yvonne; Sneem, Ireland)

1 kilo of flour (any flour other than rye flour)*

3 Tablespoons dried yeast

1 Tablespoon sugar (food for yeast)

1 cup lukewarm water

Put flour in a large mixing bowl.  Make a groove in the middle and add yeast and sugar to it.  Add water and mix the middle portion with a spoon.  Air bubbles are a sign of reactivity, and the concoction should look like a reverse volcano.  Leave it standing for 10 minutes (dependent on room temperature – leave longer for colder rooms).

After 10 minutes, start mixing and kneading the yeasty paste with one hand.  Add enough lukewarm water to create a non-sticky, solid dough as an end result.  Add salt for flavoring.  Knead dough, adding lukewarm water as necessary.  To knead dough, go down under the dough using the palm of your hand, and then fold into the middle, pushing the dough back down with the palm of your hand.  Knead as much air into the dough as possible.  You can’t knead for too long.

Let sit for at least two hours and no longer than a day in a warm environment.  Cover with cellophane. 

Once the bread is done rising, flour a cutting board and remove the bread from the bowl to knead it.  Once you’re finished kneading, put dough into a greased bread tin and bake at 425 degrees Fahrenheit for about 45 minutes.  You can tell if the bread is done by knocking on it.  If you get an answer, the job is complete. 

*For sourdough bread, use ½ rye flour and ½ regular flour with buttermilk instead of water.  Let stand at least overnight.