Mutant Seedy Bread recipe

Answering the multiple calls for the recipe of the dense, seedy bread I made yesterday.

Rolanni’s Mutant Seedy Bread

1 cup lukewarm milk

1/4 cup of (the recipe I’m riffing off of calls for orange juice, but I only had pineapple, so…)

1/4 vegetable oil

3 tablespoons of (dark) maple syrup — you can probably use molasses; I had maple syrup

2 teaspoon of yeast

1.25 teaspoons salt

3 cups whole wheat flour (I had King Arthur Golden Wheat)

1/3 cup of King Arthur whole grain mix

Mix everything together — it’ll be sticky and damp, that’s a feature — scrape it into a WELL-GREASED loaf pan, let it rise for 60-90 minutes (today it took 90 minutes for my dough to rise). Preheat the oven to 350. Bake the loaf for 40-45 minutes (today, mine wanted the whole 45 minutes), putting an aluminum foil tent over it after the first 20 minutes.

Here’s what mine looked like when I was done:

It’s been so long, eating and drinking and making merry

The Long Back Yard this morning.  Perhaps not obvious from the picture: It was snowing at the time.

OK. Thursday. Snowed about an inch this morning, just enough to freshen yesterday’s snow. Intermittently sunny — or cloudy, if you prefer it that way — at the moment.

Breakfast was eggs scrambled with spinach and onions and cheese, with a biscuit and strawberry jam on the side. Lunch…I may go back to my original plan of ham and yam, because I’m not sure those chicken breasts are thawed, actually.

Wrote about 930 words this morning, concluding a scene that I really like — Yes, this is going to be a book totally comprised of Scenes I Like. Rookie and Tali kept me company in the office, while Firefly is keeping a Very Close Eye on the bedroom.

I’m getting ready to start a loaf of bread to rise, after which it’s PT homework, one’s duty the cats, and lunch, one way or the other.

Hope everybody’s having a good day.
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Yanno? “Wonderful Christmastime?” Paul McCartney, celebrating all the lovely, lovely things that “Only happen at this time of Year” And I am Up To Here with that.

First of all — it’s a real dud on the lyrics, but so are most Christmas songs, so I guess I can’t take points off for that. But honestly? Aren’t we all supposed to be together and sharing joy and magic all the time?

Why, why does it only “happen at this time of year?” Why is it not a lifestyle choice? What is it about cruelty that is so attractive that it gets 363ish days while Joy, Magic, and Fellow Feeling only get 2ish, and only if we’ve spent enough money?

Yes, I do feel better now. And the bread’s in to rise.
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OK…The bread is really good. I had wanted a dense, seedy loaf and this one delivers. I cut it in half — one piece for the freezer and the other to eat now. Ahem. Over the course of the next couple days.

In between It All, I seem to have written 2,320 words today, which is … a lot, as we count words around here. On the other hand, as Jen Sin today observed to Miri, Traders talk A Lot. The WIP entire is somewhere around 113,480 total words.

I will mention that I wrote that many words and STILL had time to fall down the rabbit hole of Mongolian Techno. Some years back now there had been a Mongolian metal rock band — HU? HUU? — and they were doing some interesting things, but Mongolian Techno? Who knew.

Tomorrow, I have Real Life Business I have to take care of first (Well. “First,” after clearing snow, so Sarah can get in and also picking up so she can do her thing) having successfully put it off for more than a week (procrastination; it’s not for sissies).

I did read some few pages of Agent of Change, and will probably read some more after the cats stop shouting at me to deliver them their Happy Hour. What’s really interesting, is that I can remember which bits Steve wrote, and which bits I wrote, and which bits Steve wrote and I changed. I don’t think — but will be testing the proposition — that I can do that with later books. But you never forget your first, amirite?

Everybody have a good evening. Stay safe. Watch out for windblown snow and ice on the roads.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

Today’s blog post title brought to you by The Hu, from their 2019 Billboard hit, “Yuve Yuve Yu

For want of a yeast, the loaf was lost…

Well. I wrote 1,475 words today, but I only got to keep 900 of them, bringing the WIP to 106,725. More or less.

The curtains are down in Steve’s office and have taken up their temporary role as dustcovers. Firefly emphatically does not approve of this development.

Boy, am I glad I cleared this with the committeecat first.

In other news, my yeast is dead and I’m unhappy. I took it into my head to bake a cheese loaf, only it didn’t rise. My yeast, living in the freezer, is God She knows how old. However! the back-up yeast has a sell-by in 2021. I feel in my heart that I should just buy a new bag of yeast and not even try the back-up bag.

I still wanted cheese bread, though, so I made cheese muffins, which are cooling as I type.

I have some notes to write re the WIP, and then it will be Coon Cat Happy Hour.

I will therefore take this opportunity to bid everyone a good night. Stay safe. I’ll look in tomorrow.

In which the lost are found

Yesterday, I baked bread, did embroidery, carried books down to the basement and got them safely stowed, finished Phase One of the Sekrit Project, which leaves two Phases left to complete by November 14, which is totally doable.

I also found Steve’s cardinal, which was hiding behind books on the bottom-most shelf of the bookcase from which it fled.

And a bonus find…

About a million years ago, I bought Steve a sundial for his birthday. Approximately two hundred years ago, the gnomon went missing. The sundial then became a piece of glass art that sat on a bookshelt in Steve’s office.

Today, as I was looking for the cardinal, I found the gnomon for the sundial. It had been stuck to a book.

So the sundial is back together, which is pleasing, even though it I probably have no place to set it up, since — windows, cats.

Still, I’m pleased that it’s at least potentially functional again.

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Where are we? Thursday?

Thursday. Sunny, white-and-gray clouds traveling across a blue sky.

Breakfast was two slices of yesterday’s bread, toasted, cottage cheese, and grapes. Yesterday, I ate three slices of bread with butter as soon as the loaf was cool enough to slice, two slices this morning, and I foresee another slice or two with lunch. I am not usually like this, but I’m gonna finish this loaf by Saturday. Guess I needed Vitamin Bread.

Wrote 1,459 new words this morning. Did the addition, to get some idea of where I am contract-wise, and found the total WIP at 102,870, which In Theory means I can type THE END.

Yeah, yeah. We laugh at Theory.

I did sleep in, and my desk one! more! time! looks like a bomb hit it. How does this keep happening? Gremlins, I guess.

Tonight is glassworking, which means a late lunch, because class goes so late. Happily, I can sleep in tomorrow.

That? Is all the news from this side of the world.

How’s everything going for you?

Oh.  I got the sundial set:

Thursday afternoon cat census:

Ain’tcha got no rhymes for me?

What went before ONE: Well, that wasn’t what I was going to be doing when I got home.

Splinter Universe got blasted out of the water (no, I don’t know Exactly How; we’ve been having some DoS fun over at my blog, and there may have been residual damage. Or it could’ve gotten targeted just for its own self.). Whatever the cause, I spent the last couple hours trying to put it back the way it was, and finally gave up on that in favor of getting the site online again, and there I may report success.

Splinter Universe is back on line, for those who may have missed it. All the Stuff is there, but it is much simpler in appearance.

Also? Yon writin’ woman is Some Corked Off.

Tomorrow: Early mammogram, just in case I needed another reason to be grumpy.

Everybody stay safe; I’ll check in tomorrow.

What went before TWO: So…I’m sorry; I have to share this or it will haunt me all night. AARP has shared A Tip of foods to limit if you have “prediabetes” (do not get me started on “prediabetes.” Arguably we all have “prediabetes,” it’s kind of like having “predeath.” See? You didn’t have to get me started; I’m self-powered.)

Anyway, this list of things to avoid have swap outs — you know the drill, instead of pasta, have some tasty spaghetti squash. Instead of rice, have some cauliflower. And — here’s the one that will haunt me for the length of my days —

Swap out wine for!

Vodka.

Yes, yes, I’ve gone and scared the cats, and on that note, I’m going to pour a glass of wine, which I have abSOfreakingLUTELY earned this afternoon.

Tuesday. Sunny and chill, but getting warmer fast.

Trash and recycling at the curb. Mammogram accomplished. Breakfast was vanilla Skyr. Drinking my second cup of tea with the last two cranberry-walnut-oatmeal cookies. You know what this means, of course?

Right. I need to bake more cookies.

. . .

Yanno? I think I have chocolate chips.

Another bad night of sleep, with the exception of the two! whole! hours! that Firefly tucked her compact little self into my stomach, and turned her purr box on High. I’ve gotta get me some more of that.

Firefly is currently off-duty, but that does not mean I’m unsupervised. Tali and Rook are both on guard at the right-side window, so I can feel certain They won’t get in That Way.

Needlework this evening. Between now and then, I have to perform my duty to the cats, and then I believe I will address the Cookie Situation.

Y’all have enough cookies?

Today’s blog post title brought to you by Paul Simon, via Harper’s Bazaar (you may blame 60sGold on Sirius XM for this)  “59th Street Bridge Song.”

Photo of the Right Flank Guards at work:

I had a premonition that I should not go alone

What went before: One thousand two hundred seventy-three new words today, bringing the WIP entire to +/- 61,750.

Trooper has not eaten so very much today, and he several times came to me, crying, but it wasn’t food OR cuddles that he wanted. I tried brushing him (very carefully, with a slicker brush; his fur’s gotten so thin, I’m afraid I’ll scratch him), and he purred. Then he jumped down and fell asleep with all the rest of the cats, in or near one of the open windows.

It’s almost Happy Hour, after which I have another couple things to do, but basically, it’s Quittin’ Time.

Everybody stay safe; I’ll see you tomorrow.

SNIPPET:
Anthora pressed her lips together. Val Con turned to stare at her.

“Hold. Is this what I was scolded most soundly for doing on behalf of my lifemate?”

“Yes,” Anthora said, sounded goaded. “But you had done it stupidly.”

Thursday. Sunny and going to be warmer. Station air is on.

Yep, up at 6 again, though I did successfully repel borders at 4.

Today, we bake bread. The ingredients have been measured and are coming up to room temperature while I eat some vanilla skyr, drink my first cup of tea, and update the internets on the doings here at the Cat Farm and Confusion Factory.

After two “good” days in a row, Trooper again refused his gravy-with-meds. I foresee a long and fretful day, though he’s sleeping in the copilot’s chair right now.

The other cats are about. Firefly is overlooking the front garden and lawn. Rook is hanging out in front of the pantry, in case I open it again. He’s *fascinated* by the Wall that Opens. I’m not sure where Tali’s got to, which probably means she’s in a window, behind the curtains.

I didn’t manage to make either of my phone calls yesterday, and, honestly? It’s not looking good for today, though it occurs to me that I might be able to send an email to one of them. I can manage that.

Sigh. Raise your hand if you hate making phone calls.

What else? Oh. I need to add (at least) one thing to the scene I wrote yesterday, and go back a couple scenes to place Mr. Foreshadow.

Ah. Tali arrives in a burst of skitter-scramble-bam! She’s found a spring to play with. Rookie is now under the standing desk, which is in the UP position, pouting because I didn’t give him /a/n/y /o/f my cup of skyr.

Aside the bread, and my duty to the cats, and that maybe-email, that’s all I have on the list of chores. So, hoping to write another scene this afternoon.

What’re you doing today?

Today’s blog post brought to you by Mr. Glenn Frey, “Smuggler’s Blues

Last night, I had help getting ready for bed:

The Luck in Action

What went before ONE: Well, that was more excitement than I wanted from lunch.

First, I spilled almost an entire box of elbow macaroni over the kitchen floor — I always try to catch things. Often I do catch them. Even more often, the result is worse than if I had just let whatever it is fall.

Rook came rushing to the scene of the catastrophe, looked at the mess, looked up me (“Mom. What the Hell?”), then assisted in clean-up by finding the macaronis that had taken cover under the cabinets, and smacking at least one to its Forever Home under the stove.

Eventually, I got back to the cooking part of the process, and it was lunch, and I even have leftovers for lunch-in-future.

Rook’s been practicing taking selfies:

 

 

 

 

What went before TWO: Well. A Compleat Change of Plan.

I did get some writing done, but after lunch, I noticed that my back hurt, and my hips hurt, and my knees hurt, and — you get the picture, I’m sure. So! I took a couple aspirin (I’m holding on to the High Test until I’m sure I have a doctor who can prescribe more, OR until aspirin doesn’t do the trick), and then I — wait for it — took a nap.

Woke up somewhat less achy, approached the keyboard, and remembered that today’s shopping trip to the freezer had Revealed An Error.

I was out of blueberry muffins.

Clearly, that situation could not stand, and a batch of blueberry muffins is finishing up baking as I type this.

Next, I need to go back down to the basement to see if I still have blueberries. Which tangentially reminds me that I ought to be making a grocery list. (EDITED TO ADD: I have blueberries.)

So! Minor amounts of writing completed today.

Here, have a snippet: “No, Bechimo had accepted Theo Waitley as captain, and there was nothing that could induce one of Korval, be she kin or be she clan, to relinquish a ship that was in her hand. She had been adamantine, had Captain Waitley, and admitted no error – which had only made him more determined to reft the ship from her.”

Oh.  The muffins are out:

 

 

 

 

Monday. Glary, damp and coolish. Windows are open in my office.

Breakfast was . . . different from planned, due to the fact that the cottage cheese appeared to have Mystery Inclusions. So! instead of half a blueberry muffin with a side of cottage cheese, I had half a blueberry muffin with cream cheese. Lunch is likely be a sweet potato, since I’m not feeling All That ambitious.

I hereby report an Instance of the Lee-Miller Sloppy Luck. I had cut two roses off the new bush two days ago, and put them in a bud vase on the dining room table, where they remained, undisturbed and cheery, until!

. . .I’m guessing last night. Maybe early this morning. A Person Unknown — *cough* Tali *cough* — knocked the bud vase over onto a pile consisting of a SanDisk mp3 player attached to a pair of headphones, which was sitting on the case (closed) of another pair of headphones, which was next to a large book.

Reader, most of the water was still in the vase. The mp3 player was slightly damp, but is working. Both sets of headphones are untouched, as is the book. The tablecloth was a little damp, but it needed to be changed, anyway.

I did not sleep well last night, and my back is still bothering me. It occurs to me that the chiropractor was not attached to the hospital that left, so perhaps a phone call to see if I still have an In there is in order.  (EDITED TO ADD:  I still have an In, and better yet?  An appointment for this afternoon.)

Otherwise, today is a writing day. No, really. I mean it.

Looking forward to the rest of the week, tomorrow evening is sewing, after which I’ll go to the grocery. Wednesday, I am to reside in a State of Anticipation of the arrival of the Home Visit Nurse, sometime between 8am and noon. Thursday morning Ashley will arrive, and Friday morning, I get a haircut.

I should sometime soon see what’s to do in Bath, so I can have some fun and find out where my doctor’s new practice is. Maybe there’s a Reny’s.

That’s the news from the Cat Farm and Confusion Factory.

What’s happening with you?

Pics from yesterday:

Roland, the Headless Thompson Gunner

What went before: 500ish new words, bringing the total WIP to +/-21,750 words.

Knocking off a little early today, mostly because I have correspondence to write and a house to visualize.

Tomorrow, it looks like I’ll be in, unless the weather revises itself again. We have gotten nothing like the pretty bad storm the ‘beans were predicting. So far. It’s supposed to be warm and rain tomorrow, but a lot depends on timing. Right now, it’s looking like Tuesday is my day out, in between Monday’s warm-and-rain, and Wednesday’s — wait for it — snow.

Also tomorrow, I need to bake bread. I bought some harvest grain mix which I’m going to add to the Standard Whole Wheat Loaf to jazz it up a bit. There’s nothing wrong with the Standard Whole Wheat Loaf, mind you; I just prefer something a little chewier.

Tuesday, of course, is Book Day. It may also be a day to take a short drive and test the proposition that using bluetoothing both googlemaps and sirius xm from the phone will result in my having both things, with the map program interrupting the music as necessary. I’ll also see if the car’s map program will speak to me when there’s a CD in play. I would also like to speak to the person who thought that drivers only need a map or music. Must be a non-driver.

In. Any. Case.

Everybody stay safe; I’ll see you tomorrow.

Monday. Cloudy and … there’s something weatherly going on outside — frizzling, I guess.

Breakfast was the last waffle with sausage gravy. Waiting for one of my extremely rare cups of coffee to brew. I have a choice of leftovers for lunch.

The dry ingredients for today’s loaf of bread are mixed together, the other ingredients assembled and ready to be added as soon as everything warms up a bit.

Aside the bread, I have a couple of minor tasks to attend to, but today is, one! more! time!, devoted to writing and to ASL homework.

Has anyone here read Alibi by Sharon Shinn? May I have your no-spoiler impressions?

Unless I knock off really early today, or for some reason choose blanket forting, I will not finish the Honey Pot Plot today. But I probably will finish it tomorrow. It’s a spare little trilogy, but I’ve been consistently amused. I am especially amused that the Myth of the Winged Russian has leaked over from RED (now RED One)– and for all I know RED‘s writers got it from somewhere else. The Winged Russian really deserves a place beside Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner. For those who haven’t read it, the first book is Rocky Start, by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer.

I’ve been rotating between reading on the couch in the evening and reading in bed. The cats are trying to work with it, but I get the sense that they prefer reading on the couch, which, after all, has History behind it. Last night was a couch night, and they all four came in to join me. Tali took the top platform of the cat tree, so she could overlook the whole room. Trooper claimed his usual corner of the couch. Firefly snuggled in hard against my hip, and Rook got up on the back of the sofa and put his paw on my shoulder.

And that’s the Monday morning report from the Cat Farm and Confusion Factory.

How’s Monday treating you so far?

Today’s blog title brought to you by Mr. Warren Zevon, “Roland, the Headless Thompson Gunner.”

Big wind, tiny void

Big wind tiny void
curls in safety, softly warm
Big wind dies, void sighs

–Haiku off the cuff, Sharon Lee

What went before ONE: And the bread’s out. Not a bad looking loaf, though I got a little carried away with the dusting.

Recipe here

TWO:  Big wind blowing. The Teeniest Void Kitten climbed into my lap when it started, and curled up into a knot the size of Rhode Island.

This of course makes it very easy to type.

Ren Zel and Anthora are an … interesting couple.

THREE:  What went before: So, I thought I was waiting for a box of bookmarks today, but it turns out that what I was really waiting for was a box full of Ribbon Dance mmps! Coming out on April 29!

In re BaltiCon: People are asking if there will be a Friends of Liad breakfast and/or a Teddy Bear Tea.

The Friends of Liad breakfast, which is not a con event, but a gathering of the clan to share a meal, and to catch up with each other, is definitely possible; the hotel restaurant is able to accommodate a group. I can’t tell you when, because I need to find what my schedule will be.

Teddy Bear Tea: is traditionally a con event, and therefore vulnerable, as all events, to the necessities of the program.

Bottom Line: I don’t have any information to share until I get together with BaltiCon Programming, and their schedule is finalized.

Summing Up: Watch the skies.

Saturday. Sunny and gonna get warm. Monday, say the weatherbeans, it will snow.

Breakfast was naan, hummus, and a mini-orange. Second cup of tea to hand. Lunch is on the knees of Zao Shen.

This morning, I need to change the strip that keeps the heart monitor stuck to my chest. No, I am not happy about this.

After that — we’ll see. Maybe I’ll go for a ride, being as it’s gonna be so warm and all. I haven’t been to Belfast since forever. Maybe get lunch at the coop. That could work.

In other news, and in the spirit of saving the best for last — it comes about that the anniversary edition of I DARE will be published by Baen in December. Here’s the new cover; art by Sam Kennedy.