In an effort to become a useful person, I told myself at the beginning of 2024 that I would teach myself a new skill every week. This continued for about two months in an unstable state. I made butter, learned how to knit and cross-stitch, and even learned to cut my own hair.
None of this anchored these skills in the same way as sourdough making, the hobby I've come to appreciate the most.
Making sourdough isn't the most difficult culinary task I've ever attempted, but it does require you to work on other unskilled skills, especially patience.
My roommate first introduced me to sourdough starter, and I taught myself how to make bread with online video tutorials. I'm grateful that it's a simple, inexpensive, yet incredibly rewarding hobby to share with friends and family.
I'm pretty much self-taught (in a bad way) when it comes to kitchen stuff. Like many people my age, I can follow recipes and make simple things, but it wasn't a skill I grew up with or was particularly good at.
Making bread just wasn't on my bingo card, so to speak. Especially since I accidentally added salt instead of sugar to a batch of cookies in college. But I learned, and I'm grateful I did.
I appreciate not having to go to the store and buy an $8 loaf of bread made with ingredients I can't pronounce. I am also grateful to be able to give bread to my friends. That way, they don't have to buy an $8 loaf of bread with ingredients they can't pronounce at the store.
I'm grateful that my dad asked me to make bread for his birthday instead of the more gruesome task of baking a cake.
Making sourdough isn't the most difficult culinary task I've ever attempted, but it does require you to work on other unskilled skills, especially patience. The most difficult part of the bread-making process is called bulk fermentation, which takes about 12 hours to ferment the dough. If you bake the bread too quickly, the bottom of the bread will dent and the crumb texture will become dense and sticky. Both qualities are undesirable in good bread, but I've encountered them many times.
I'm not a particularly patient person. It's easy to blame social media for damaging my focus and, by extension, my brain, but I've never been a patient person. The saying “Good things come to those who wait” was the antithesis of my life.
But I couldn't get around that in bread making. There were no shortcuts. Believe me, many attempts were made.
So now when I give bread to a friend, I can do so knowing that I made it with patience and care and it will be very delicious. I'm grateful for that.
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