Fraught with adversity

Some weeks.  I mean, really.

I think I'm a pretty good baker.  I don't screw up a lot.  But jeepers, this week!

I guess it started with the bohemian bread I really wanted to bake.  It called for rye flour.  How hard can that be, to find rye flour?  Isn't it everywhere?  No.  Four towns and eight  (yes, eight) stores later, I bought a 2 pound bag (you know how much 2 pounds is?  about 6 cups in volume -- that's nothing) at the only health food store in what I believe is about a fifty-mile radius.  FYI, folks:  rye flour isn't a health food.  And also FYI, folks:  it wasn't particularly cheap.

So I made up a batch of bohemian bread.  It was in fact quite good, but not what I wanted:  I wanted more rye bread flavor.  I'd only topped it with the caraway seeds, not worked them into the dough.  So I made a second batch with wonderful caraway seeds all loaded up within -- one recipe makes two loaves.  This time the breads rose nicely prior to baking, then fell in their centers (too much moisture in the dough).  Well, I'm not going to sell that!  But then I was out of rye flour and out of time to make another run to the health food store.

This morning I made soda bread rolls.  Too big, too dense, but seriously tasty -- butter 'em up and oh, Lordy!  I can't even imagine them with jam.  We'll eat them here.  Will try again tonight and make smaller rolls.

I forgot and left my first batch of savory herbed loaves in the oven while I took my mother to the hairdresser.  Can you say "door stop"?  Actually they're not heavy; just hard (like "the victim was struck with a blunt object" hard).  I'm going to take a shot at making them into croutons, which if successful will be absolutely delicious.

Let's not talk about the soup that fell out of the refrigerator.

Just so you know I'm not a complete flubber-di-blub (is that a term?  Like flibbertigibbet?) -- but perhaps a will-o'-th'-wisp, a clown (yeeaahh, nootttt. . . .) -- here are some of the non-casualties: