Making a lot of Dough

It seems everyone is baking bread during their home isolation. Even if they never made it before. The flour and yeast aisles are pretty much bare at the grocery stores. And many people are making sour dough bread starter (because you don’t need yeast). I’m pretty sure if sourdough starter were a vaccine we’d have enough, just in Calgary, for the entire planet.

I think we have a love hate relationship with bread. On the one hand it is irresistible fresh out of the oven with some real butter or some jam. Even with nothing. Just rip off a chunk and inhale it. Let’s not forget the way it makes your house smell like heaven while it’s baking. On the other hand, it’s straight up carbs and there are many that don’t feel people that eat carbs are worth taking up space on the earth. Carbs are the enemy. Thus, bread is too.

But I don’t think there are very many that can turn down fresh baked even if they don’t believe in it. If you are a perpetrator of fresh bread expect to be despised by these ‘no carb’ cults.

I’m pretty sure that bakers and cooks and even regular people are buying up all the flour and yeast because they are convinced that, if you have these, you can bake bread and you’ll always have food. (don’t get me started on the just add water pancake mix). It reminds me of the manna that the Lord provided daily for the Israelites when they were wandering in the desert. They did live on bread alone. And I don’t remember reading that the Lord switched it up at all. No wonder they were complaining that the food in Egyptian slavery was better.

There are so many ways to do bread. Fresh. Ripped. Sliced. Toasted. Cinnamon buns. Raisin bread. Focaccia. Naan. Bruschetta. Bread pudding. Croissants. Sandwiches. French toast. Croutons. Sourdough. Banana bread. Stuffing. Dinner rolls. Bread sticks. Crustinis. Crumbs. And it’s all good.

There is no denying that bread is comfort food. Maybe that’s what everyone is after. The Comfort. These are unpredictable times and everything is changing daily. We don’t know what’s true or real. Bread is stable and certain and gives us what we want. Bread is bread and it’s makes us feel good (until it doesn’t). Helps us forget about the crazy, even if only while we are eating it or baking it or smelling it. Who says we aren’t making a lot of dough staying at home?  I know I am.