Tanglewood Bakery: The Flour (and it's rich historical origins)

The De Zwaan (meaning the Swan), now standing in the city of Holland, Michigan, has a rich and exciting past. It was first built in 1761 in Krommenie, near Amsterdam, and was moved in 1889 to Noord Brabant. The inspiringly beautiful structure survived wars and natural decay, albeit just barely. In 1964, the windmill was transferred to Holland, Michigan in sore shape. It had been the source of frustration and controversy for the Dutch government much in part due to it's poor condition, and when it left the Netherlands it became the very last Dutch windmill to leave before the government there decided to ban the sale of their precious historical windmills. It is now the only operating Dutch Windmill in the United States.

There have been changes made to the mill over the years. It's original state would've been atop a hill, and it would've been a bit shorter simply because it was placed in an area with excellent winds, as opposed to Holland's Michigan's intermittent mini-gales off of Lake Michigan. Still, the history literally oozes out of it when you step inside. The rich smell of ground wheat permeates the air, even on a crisp autumn afternoon. The interior is a fortified and complicated structure that upon first glance is incredibly overwhelming. Still, as you start to run your eyes across gears and pulleys and levers, you can start to grasp the amazing mechanics of this large beautiful beast of a machine. 

I was so lucky to get a full tour from Alisa Crawford, the miller, and her assistant, Dick. They are both so obviously passionate about the mill that it's no wonder it is so well cared for. Ms Crawford is an inspiration herself. She has worked very hard to become the only certified Dutch miller in the Americas, not to mention the only female member of the Dutch miller's guild. Of course in order to do this, she had to learn to speak Dutch, which is no mean feat. She has been working with various historical mills for much of her life, and the De Zwaan seems to have become her baby. You can feel the very strong bond between the miller and her mill simply by listening to her speak. 

Did you know that the entire cap of a dutch windmill rotates to accommodate changing wind direction? This spoked wheel is how they do it! They walk along the spokes and turn the monsterous cap to face the wind... amazing!

I was so lucky to be able to buy flour ground on this amazing mill for my blossoming bakery business. It's exciting to know that the flour I bake with comes from technology and mechanisms designed 250 years ago. Even more exciting was the "hook up" that Alisa offered me when she discovered I was interested in historical agriculture and modern sustainability. 

De Zwaan actually had taken in some wheat earlier in the year from Primrose Farm in Illinois to grind and return to the farm. Now, I know Illinois isn't as local as Michigan grown wheat, but Primrose Farm is an historical living farm that plants and harvests using their powerful draft horses, and threshes using equipment and technology from the late 19th century. They aren't certified organic, but because they use methods of farming from before the introduction of synthetic chemicals to agriculture, their grains are grown naturally and without sprays. 

 

I borrowed these photos from the Primrose Farm facebook page where there is all sorts of information on their seasonal educational programs and their beautiful produce stand.

When Alisa offered me this amazing flour, which is not only from high quality grain but beautifully ground and sieved, I couldn't say no. I snatched it up and immediately began adjusting my recipes to accommodate the finicky nature of whole grain hard red wheat, laden with high levels of healthy proteins (as opposed to soft red wheat, which is higher in starches). I am happy to sacrifice the simplicity and ease of baking with soft wheat to know that I am using a sustainable and natural product farmed using methods from before my grandparents were born. 


Using such amazing flour has really inspired me to examine the concept of modern Craft as opposed to craft. When something is made by a person so intimately involved, you can feel it, see it and in this case you can even taste it. The products that I bake with this flour are often very hardy and tend to want to be heavy, but through careful recipe balancing (and rebalancing, and rebalancing - heh) I've worked hard and produced delicate and delicious results. 


(Of course, you know now I'm researching planting one of the back strips in wheat this year... I'd love to be even more involved with the flour I use!)

Tanglewood Bakery: First Market Recap

Jeremy and I set up the Bakery booth at MIX Marketplace in Ypsilanti, Michigan yesterday. I was running late (when am I not?) but we managed to get there and get set up before anybody approached the table so that was nice. 

The overall aesthetic of the table was a huge success. We got some fabulous compliments, many people remarking on how they loved the set up and that they'd never seen such beautiful baked goods. I can't tell you how nice it was to hear that, especially after so much last-minute work!

We had TONS of samples for people, and we even had two people stop by, obviously disinterested, shove a sample in their mouths and after walking a few steps, stop in their tracks, spin on their heels and rush back to buy something... A look of desperate sweet-tooth-dom on their faces. I can't tell you how good that made me feel. I've had that moment at a market, and I love that I can give it to others. Nomnomnom. 

The bundt cakes didn't sell much, but we didn't have any samples out and I'm confident they would've sold more if they'd either been available to sample or topped with a more visible frosting (people love frosting... I learned that one quick).

The biggest seller was definitely whoopie pies. I'm a little bummed I didn't get my adorable "Gobby Hand Cake" labels on them, but they sold well all the same. 

Another item that received very high praise was the dark chocolate shortbread with pink peppercorn and fleur de sel. Chocolate lovers definitely enjoyed this one, and I got tons of compliments on the presentation. One particularly interesting individual told me that they tasted like pizza, fruit cake and Dessert, and went on to say Dessert differed from the usual usage of the word because he didn't just mean dessert, like sweets. He meant Dessert in the sense that it comes after a very good meal and intermingles with the flavors from that meal to create a perfect finish. It was both the most unique and inspiring compliment I received all day! He had some really great things to say about all of the samples, and really taught me a thing or two about my own prejudices against first impressions... I kinda hope he comes back next time!

One thing that people were drawn to more than I expected were the fig caramel and chocolate tarts. I really just made these for myself since I'm a huge fan of figs, but they were received well and with open arms and mouths... :)

So... I can't begin to explain how exhausted I am right now. I'll be at the MIX marketplace again on the 28th. For now, in the slow season, I'll stick to every other week so I can continue to build new recipes on the off weeks. Yesterday morning I was convinced that I'd be burned out and never want to bake again, and this morning I woke up inspired to balance new recipes and learn new techniques, ASAP!

Operation Market Debut: Success!

Prepping for Market: The Display

It seems like 2012 got here a lot faster than anticipated. I feel ready. Right?

This Saturday Tanglewood Bakery will be setting up at the first market of 2012. It's called MIX marketplace and it's a new indoor farmer's market in Ypsilanti, MI. They had great response from the holiday crowd, so hopefully people will be equally thrilled to visit weekly now that the holidays have passed us.

I've been doing lots of things, both necessary and unnecessary, to prep for the market. First of all, I want a super fleshed out aesthetic for my booth. I want everything to look like it belongs there. To do this, I've been making my own displays (yay basic carpentry!) and I've chosen to stick with my ever-favorite teal, oatmeal and salmon color-scheme. I've been making list upon list of things to do, places to go, things to prep, things to stage and things to bake. It should be fun! (right?)

Here is a quick photo of the cupcake case I made yesterday, in it's salmon and teal glory. I have such a soft spot for victorian kitsch it's ridiculous. I can't wait to photograph the whole booth to show you, when it's actually set up!

So now that I have the bulk of my booth display complete, it's time to get into the kitchen! This is the first time I've prepped for market, so I'm sure I'll be an insane whirlwind of madness, despair and mania. Bwahaha. Wish me luck!

Dark Days: Potato Leek with Bacon and Carrots

The farmer's markets have really slowed to a crawl here in Michigan, as I suspect they have done all over the northern regions. There are still the staples though, like potatoes, carrots, beets, parsnips, leeks... I feel like we've almost collapsed into soup season. I find myself craving warm soup almost constantly and I've honestly never been much of a soup maker, so I figured for my latest Dark Days meal I would pull together some Potato Leek soup, flavored with Bacon. We are lucky to have local dairy and I try to keep fresh cream and butter in the fridge at all times, so this was a piece of cake.

Apart from using a recipe to tell me that I should cook my bacon and leeks in a skillet beforehand, I went at this completely recipe-free. I'm never shy about using fats in cooking, and Jeremy and I seem to maintain healthy weights simply by eating in moderation, so please forgive the amount of cream, butter and bacon fat that went into this. You'd certainly forgive it if you'd tasted it yourself!

Basically I boiled potatoes to the mashing point (skin-on) and then took 2/3rds of them and tossed them in a food processor. I then took my potato slop and added enough cream (and a little melted butter) to make them easy to stir and heated them on medium heat while I cooked my bacon and sliced leek in a cast iron skillet. When I finished the bacon and leeks, I tossed them into the pot, adding some of the bacon grease as well (uh, yum...) I then sliced the last of this season's carrots and tossed them in as well. I left this on the stove at low heat for a few hours while I went off to muck horse stalls and teach a lesson, and I assigned my husband to stirring every 20 minutes or so which he did diligently as soon as he learned there was bacon at stake. (Who wouldn't?)

When I returned home from work, I sliced the remaining cooked potatoes, tossed them in and heated the soup so that they would warm. I salted the soup just a bit (not locally sourced, but purchased from a small mom-and-pop spice merchant known for sourcing ethically grown spices) and added some of my own organic thyme and rosemary.

I can honestly say this is a soup hearty enough for giants. I had originally planned to bake up a quick lump of unleavened bread to accompany it (we are also lucky enough to have local flour here in Michigan) but honestly it didn't need it. We quickly scarfed down our single bowls of soup and lay around like gorged sheep for an hour afterwards. Super. Duper. Hearty. and sooo delicious.

This has really inspired me to get cracking on soups. I'd really love to make a sweet parsnip soup and - Woah. It just occurred to me that it's Saturday and the winter market is open! I'm going to go buy some parsnips! :)

Picking it back up again

In case you hadn't heard via my twitter/facebook selves, I was lucky enough to lose my entire hard drive right before the holidays (note sarcasm). Apart from a few photographs still on my phone, I lost every photograph I have taken digitally in the past six years (the span of my relationship with my now husband, the span of my bakery, the span of many things...) I also lost passwords, programs, financial records, business contacts (like the 100+ addresses we mail camp flyers to each year!) ... oh geez.

It has been really discouraging, and I've hard a hard time coming back to the blog to do anything other than open a blank window and stare, realizing I have no pretty pictures to accompany my posts.

Still, this morning I found myself inspired to pick everything back up and get into it again. I transferred my photos from my phone, and while I'm left without much in the way of garden photos, I can still type your little ears (eyes?) off in a meandering deluge of scatterbrained thoughts and notions. Voila!

The weather has been bizarre lately, and from what I hear it's been strange everywhere in the country. Yesterday we had sun and it was a fair 56º F. It's January, for chrissake. I found myself digging the thawed mess out of the chicken and duck coops with a vengeance, and realized that this means I'll only have half a winter's worth of mucking when it thaws again in spring! Of course, this is assuming it ever truly freezes.

I also spent my morning putting up some new step-in electronet fencing for the sheep to graze in. Step-in. In January. I shouldn't be able to so much as bend a blade of grass, let alone shove fence posts into the ground! Very strange. It feels like I should be planting bareroot plants and setting seedlings out to harden off. It feels like I should be sitting beside the firepit out back, dodging waves of steam as they roll off the maple sap vats.

Obviously this is pre-thaw. I wouldn't be able to put in fencing when there is snow on the ground like this!

That's another thing; what are the maple trees doing in all of this? If we don't get a true deep-freeze when we need it and the trees are forced to lose more moisture, are we going to have a sugaring season at all? I can't imagine much sap will rise if the trees have spent half their winter in a groggy daze. Hm.

The weather is supposed to linger in the low and high 40's for the rest of the week and I suppose I'll make the best of it. This warm snap has reminded me that I need to order my bareroot fruits asap to make sure I get them before the nurseries run out this year. Did I mention I've decided to focus on fruit this year? I love to grow vegetables, and Jeremy and I are teaching ourselves to enjoy them more and more, but my true love of eating fresh fruits reigns supreme and I've decided to give in to my urges and turn our entire south garden into fruits this year by adding another 10-15 blackberries, 12 gooseberries and 10 currants (not to mention a variety of dew berries, boysenberries, and any other bizarre cultivar I can find). I was even considering putting in an in-ground, lined bog to grow cranberries in... Hmm...

I feel like I have to have things all planned and ready to go asap, but honestly I still have approximately 140 days until last frost so.... Wah wah.

Fiber Giveaway Winner!

Update: We have a winner! Our winner is #6 - Kelly H, who said "I'm a knitter, and wannabe spinner, so I'd be using your lovely wool to learn how. I'd also use some to needle-felt fix a small hole in my favouritest sweater that a moth found last year. We're going to be educating ourselves on sheep farming this winter, with big dreams in mind. What made you decide on Icelandics?"

Congratulations! Be sure to check back for additional giveaways this winter. I've got at least three, maybe four lined up and they're all going to be awesome! (I may do a few more fiber giveaways as I destash some of the bags of fuzz I have amassing in my house!)

 

In the meantime, here's a photo of our latest visitor here at Tanglewood. His name is Ollie and he is a pure bred grey moorit Icelandic from Queso Cabeza in Olivet. He is a lamb ram who gets to make his breeding debut here with our three lovely ladies... 

that is if he can ever catch them!
 LOL!

A Wooly Anniversary and A Holiday Giveaway!

While tossing the last of the windfall apples into the sheep field on Thursday, I had to smile. My ewes now know to line up when I start scouring the ground under the apple trees that are outside their field. They shuffle each other out of the way, grunting and throwing mini sheep-tantrums (they literally jump right up into the air and then STOMP as hard as they can on the ground - all four feet - it's omgSOcute). I can run my eyes across them and gauge their condition (OH they are fat). I can watch the way they interact to know who is the boss today (it changes daily!) and I can spot a runny nose from across the yard.

I have spent the last year learning many things about Icelandic sheep. A lot of these lessons have been hard. I lost poor Ingrid to "grass tetany" or magnesium deficiency in spring. Her darling little lamb, Brighid, bounced back quickly and after a few bottles of warm local goat milk she had decided to wean herself. Brighid grew very close to my other ewe, Gertrude, after her mother's death. 

Unfortunately this fall, after a very long, hot summer, Gertrude succumbed to all sorts of complications of white muscle disease (WMD). She hung on for so long and tried so long and taught me so much in the time that she was ill. I have never had to learn so quickly about animal supplements, shots, treatments... and I've never seen an animal fight so hard to live. She was incredibly inspiring. 

After that, Brighid was introduced to her two new sisters, Blaire and Nance, who were a little rough with her at first but these days Brighid and Blaire are totally inseparable.

Of course, there have been fantastic moments as well. When Gertrude was around, my heart would leap every time she ran up to me for treats. She was a special sheep with a great personality. There was also Brighid's birth, which I actually got to see! Little itty bitty Brighid nose, poking out... aww... I remember running to the house to get Jeremy and by the time I got back to the barn, Brighy was standing and bleating her first little bleats... Of course, I cried a little from relief. :)

So here I am, a year later, with entirely different ewes and all the mileage and lessons of a year tucked neatly, albeit slightly emotionally, behind me. What better way to celebrate? Playing with fiber!

You can find my wet felting tutorial over at Not Dabbling in Normal!

 

Do you have any awesome fibery ideas? To celebrate, I have 4 ounces of fuzzy warm Icelandic fleece looking for a new home! (Forgive me, this is my first giveaway!) 

One winner will be chosen via random-number-generator on Sunday, December 18th at Midnight and will be posted here the following day. Please make sure you include some method of contact information so I can find you after the drawing!

Entries are open through the weekend. If I get more than 50 entries, I'll add a second winner!

I'll contact the winner(s) after the drawing and you can let me know what color you prefer your fiber to be. This is RAW fleece, which means it's unwashed, but it'll be prime fleece. It'll be individual locks of Icelandic fiber (tog and thel - it's a double layered fleece) that you can spin, felt or you can use the curly locks for dolls!

To Enter:

Simply comment below, before the cut-off on December 18th, with your favorite fibery project!

Want a second chance to enter? Post this blog entry to your twitter OR your facebook, and then come back here and comment AGAIN letting me know you did so! 

Only two entries per person, sorry!

---

Update: We have a winner! Our winner is #6 - Kelly H, who said "I'm a knitter, and wannabe spinner, so I'd be using your lovely wool to learn how. I'd also use some to needle-felt fix a small hole in my favouritest sweater that a moth found last year. We're going to be educating ourselves on sheep farming this winter, with big dreams in mind. What made you decide on Icelandics?"

Congratulations! Be sure to check back for additional giveaways this winter. I've got at least three, maybe four lined up and they're all going to be awesome! (I may do a few more fiber giveaways as I destash some of the bags of fuzz I have amassing in my house!)

Another Dark Days Post, or Why I shouldn't be allowed to take on challenges right before the holidays

My GOODNESS I'm difficult to keep on track.

I have like 8 projects simultaneously started right now, none of which were a blog post to cover the local meal we had for the Dark Days Challenge this week. I cannot believe how immensely BUSY I've been this past week! This whole handmade Christmas thing might be getting ridiculous. Yeesh. I think I've taken it too far... again.

Of course, I didn't manage to get photos of it, but it was delicious all the same! Wednesday of this week we made some of the best nachos I've ever eaten and they were almost exclusively local!

We are lucky to be able to buy our tortilla chips from the Ann Arbor Tortilla company. They come flavored with natural lime and salt, and their corn masa is never from genetically modified corn. They're the best. Ever. Seriously. If you find them in a store near you, give them a shot!

Atop our wonderful local chips we had chorizo from the farmer's market, corn that I had frozen from the farm stand earlier this year, shredded cheese from Traffic Jam's fantastic dairy in Detroit, sour cream from Calder's dairy which we have delivered weekly, pickled jalepeno and carrot relish (naturally fermented) from the Brinery in Ann Arbor (best pickles ever) and topped off with ... organic canned black beans.

I can't do nachos without black beans and I haven't yet mustered the enthusiasm to cook beans fresh for my mexican food. Ahhhh well...

So I'm feeling like this is kind of a boring post without photos of our nachos. What I CAN share is photos from our recent outing to Frita Batidos in Ann Arbor. Frita is a cuban and honduran inspired sandwich shop known for it's support of local agriculture and small farms. It's owner, Eve, is a big name in Ann Arbor locavore culture, and I cannot stress enough how fantastic the food at this restaurant is.

First of all, they serve their freshly made ginger lime juice in a twisted sandwich bag the same way juices are served on the streets of Honduras, where Eve took her Frita staff to research the cuisine and culture.

 

Second of all, they offer a chorizo sandwich topped with fresh cilantro lime salsa, sweet chili mayo AND fritas - French Fries! Oh my gosh. So delicious.

The interesting thing is that the chorizo they serve there is actually the same chorizo we had on our nachos at home. How do I know? Well, while we were sitting there eating lunch, the farmer we buy our chorizo from came into the restaurant hauling a HUGE wheeled cooler brimming with pork and wearing his farm boots, woolen hat and insulated carhart coveralls. The cooler had to contain at least an entire pig. Most of the customers stared on in bewildered horror... Jeremy and I just smiled.

Ah, the farmer. Ah, local food.

Christmas Couch-Sleeping

The Husband and I have been sleeping on our couch. No, we're not simultaneously "in the doghouse" and No, we're not avoiding our bedroom because of ghosts...

We've been sleeping on the couch because in this house, until you get every single window triple sealed with storm window, weatherproofing putty and shrinky plastic, the warmest room in the house is our living room.

The thing that helps is that our couch is an early Victorian sofa with a very unique modern cut, so it's very deep and very long. It's actually more than half the width of our bed anyway, and it's at least 6" longer (we sleep on an antique bed and mattresses - have I mentioned how conventional we aren't?) so the couch works pretty well as a warm-snuggley substitute.

I could see how the necessity of this inconvenience would drive some people totally bonkers. They'd say things like "Why not just get a heated blanket?" "Why not finish sealing all of your windows (thus making the atmosphere of the house something akin to living in a goldfish bowl...)?" "Doesn't it make you squirrely to have to sleep on your couch omg omg?"  "What is wrong with you?!"

The truth is, we don't mind. Last night we put up our itty bitty potted Christmas tree in our living room, with the LOTR movies playing in the background and (real) hot chocolate with fresh vanilla whipped cream. Honestly, guys, getting in the Christmas spirit just doesn't get any better than a good snuggle. It's not about the presents or even the mad-dash traveling to see family and friends. It's about finding the inner warm and fuzzy place and holding on to it through the cold weather. We fell asleep with the fire roaring and the Christmas tree lights twinkling, and I didn't even mind when the husband elbowed me in the face when he rolled over.


Now that is Christmas.

Forging through the Dark Days

In Michigan these days really are dark. At seven this morning it was literally black as pitch out and I managed to stay huddled in bed until at least eight thirty before the dirty, dusky light crawling in through my un-curtained my window. If only we had a layer of snow to reflect the teeeeeensy bit of light we get before eight.

My Dark Days post this week is about preparing for a fantastic Dark Days Dessert tonight, rather than actually executing it. I know, lame, right?

I do (in honesty) have a great excuse though... I had planned my fantastic Dark Days execution for last night, so I could get it just under the wire with my recapper over at Not Dabbling in Normal. Then, in a fit of madness while at work, I helped my barn manager catch a very stray kitten and managed to get a really nasty bite. My evening dissolved into a whirlwind of phonecalls to the health department; a long drive to the humane society; scrubbing, soaking and rescrubbing the bite wound; trying not to think about rabies (which is unfortunately something we have to worry about in Michigan); and finally a small inner war at the end of the night when husband suggested rather than cooking we go to the local health food store for pizza. When he mentioned he would personally go pick it up and I wouldn't have to do anything, I admit, my resolve dissolved... heh. At least the pizza was made using whole grains and rBST free ingredients. *fail*

Anyway, this is my plan for today....

I battled with motivation all morning (literally from the moment I opened my eyes), thinking about dropping out of the DD even before it started. I realized that's seriously silly though. We eat SOLE foods regularly, and just because I hadn't managed to do a write up on any of the meals we've had so far doesn't mean I should give up. Right?

 

So I walked into the kitchen and suddenly remembered the adorable Bosc pears that I purchased at our local Ann Arbor farmers' market two days ago. Mmm. Pears. The most readily available local ingredients that we have around our house are definitely baking ingredients, so I figured Hey! Spiced Pear Pies.

Well, unfortunately in the dark days challenge I am trying to stay as local as I can, and spices really aren't all that local to Michigan, so I was left trying to come up with a recipe that would add a zing to the soft mute flavor that is pear.

What do we grow in Michigan that is zingy? Well, not much. We don't grow citrus, that's for sure, and spice beyond the brazen capsaicin of simple dried chili peppers is pretty hard to come by. We have native sumac, which can be used as a lemon substitute, but I'm not quite sure how to process sumac into a usable substance yet. I'll get there, I'm just a little intimidated by the large fuzzy spires on the staghorn bushes in the woods.

Then it struck me - another zingy thing that most people overlook - rose hips! They're totally in season now too, having mellowed just a tad from the recent freezes we've had. I googled a bit and found a spectacular looking recipe for rose hip and pear pie (so it's really "a thing"!) so as soon as I finish here and hit "publish" (and I suppose I should try to forward this on to Jen at Not Dabbling so she gets my lame-o cop-out update for this week) I will pull on my wellies and a couple wool fisherman's sweaters, top myself off with a stocking cap and trudge out into the orchard where the wild rose bushes grow.

I don't want to take too many rose hips from the birds, but I figure I can glean a few pounds without affecting them too drastically. Our orchard is literally brimming with rose bushes... hundreds of them. I'm pretty sure they're all multiflora rosa, so they're the nasty invasive type. I'll try to see this as I'm preventing a small percentage of additional seed-fall, to keep the invasive species at bay. Hah.