A Chance Encounter with Simple Organics: Organic Vegetables Welcome New Development Opportunities

A friend sent a bag of flour from far away.

"...My family bought this organic flour, and it came with a packet of yeast, but no one knows how to cook with it. I remembered you once said you used to make steamed buns in a foreign country, so I'm sending it to you. Don't forget you have to make some for me to eat next time we meet." Reading the letter, I couldn't help but laugh. Never mind that I'm now back in Taiwan, China, where you can buy any kind of food you want, and living in Tainan, which is known as the capital of gourmet food. On top of that, the little place I rent doesn't even have a kitchen. Wasn't this bag of flour sent to the wrong person?

But I'm easily tempted by food. Looking at the flour, I couldn't help recalling how I first started making steamed buns, mantou, and scallion pancakes because I couldn't find any Chinese wheat-based food to satisfy my cravings, and later I even went so far as to make hand-pulled noodles, spreading a whole tableful of flour-based dishes out in grand style... But but but, on second thought: I only have to walk to the mouth of the alley and I can buy steamed buns, mantou, and scallion pancakes morning and night. The pickled mustard green and shredded pork noodles and dumplings at the old Shandong man's place at the street corner in the back alley are so authentic that even a picky eater like me can't help going back to report in every few days, then coming home satisfied with a greasy mouth. Make wheat-based food myself? That's just asking for trouble!

So that bag of flour became a suspense. My friend sent it from thousands of miles away, and this gesture of goodwill had to be entrusted to a good home.

I thought about finding someone to take it in, but for a while had no candidate, until last week when a drizzling spring rain began without warning. On that long rainy night, for some reason I suddenly really wanted to eat European-style bread. Human desire, once it stirs, truly cannot be stopped. Looking at that bag of organic flour and the only kitchen tool I had, a small oven, I thought of an article I'd once read about no-knead bread... After about ten seconds of deliberation, fine, I'll go for it.

I searched online for a recipe. Hmm... I don't have a digital scale or measuring spoons, but I figure the ancients didn't have digital scales either, right? European-style bread is hardly some recent invention. So I'd consider the capacity of my small fridge, then adjust the quantities based on my old memories of making mantou. And thus my own personal intuitive simple-ratio exclusive recipe was born:

Preliminary setup: a good-looking TV series or a good-sounding CD and a good book, paired with a quiet, relaxed mood.
Vessels to prepare: a pair of hands and a fork, a bowl, a pudding spoon, a cup, and a slightly larger pot (at least about the size of a six-serving rice cooker), and a tiny, tiny, tiny oven.
Ingredients to prepare: flour, yeast, sugar, salt, water.

Step:
1. Play the video or CD, wash your hands and dry them, and happily prepare to start playing.

2. First pour about 1/5 cup of water into a cup, then add some hot water and mix. Use chopsticks to drip a bit onto the back of your hand like testing baby milk. If it's neither cold nor hot, that's just the right temperature. Pinch in a tiny bit of sugar and 3 pudding spoons of yeast, pour into the water and stir evenly, then let it sit.

3. Take a small rice bowl and gently pour six bowls of flour into a clean pot.

4. When the yeast water starts to produce bubbles up to about half the water level, mix in cold water and two tiny pinches of salt. The total amount of water should be 3 small rice bowls.

5. Pour the mixed water into the flour and stir evenly, then wait. At this point you can wash your hands and focus on watching the video, reading a book, or doing laundry.

6. After about the time it takes to watch one TV series or read a 200-page novel (because yeast likes suitable warmth, the time will vary slightly depending on room temperature), wait until the dough has risen to twice its original size. Sprinkle in some dry flour by hand, grab an appropriate portion, cut it off with a clean knife, and gently shape the dough into a suitable size on hands covered with dry flour. The movements should be careful and gentle, as if handling a newborn baby, so as not to press out the air in the dough. Once the shape is satisfactory, place it on a baking tray and prepare for the second rise.

7. Seal the pot with the remaining dough with plastic wrap, poke two or three small holes to let the dough breathe, then put it in the fridge and give it time to become even tastier and more fragrant dough. The cool environment of the fridge can let the dough rest for about a week without spoiling. During that time, whenever you want bread, bring it out and let it contribute a portion or two. For the method, refer to Step 6.

8. Still about the time of one TV series or one CD. Preheat the oven for 3 minutes, then send in the dough that has grown to about 1.5 times its size to bake. After 15 minutes, a crisp, lovely "ding" sounds, and the no-knead handmade European-style bread comes joyfully out of the oven to meet you.

While chewing the hot, sweet fragrance of the bread, I snapped a photo, then opened the computer and began to write a letter:

"The flour you sent awakened memories of making noodles back in the snowy country. Though Taiwan, China has no pleasant snowy scenery, the rainy streets toward evening have a special charm of their own; just like freshly opened steamed buns and freshly baked European-style bread, though their flavors are East and West, they do not hide their common origin, that fragrant sweetness belonging to the homeland..."
(This article was published in China Daily on 2012.07.23)