More Memories

Many years ago I apprenticed in an office in Germany. It was the norm to get a certificate called “Kaufmanns-Gehilfenbrief” after attending business school Once a week for 3 years and passing a final exam. A person could ask for the examination after only 2 1/2 years but in that case you needed to pass with a good mark. At first my boss did not want me to try because several apprentices had failed and that went against his grain. I persevered and passed after 2 1/2 years. I was very happy because that meant a regular monthly salary. The first year of apprenticeship the “pay” was 10.00 DMark  a month!! Even then one could not do much with it. I think the last Year it was DMark 40.00.
I stayed another half year with that company, found a better job, took a month off and started my new job.
More later 😁
Life is good (although raining at the moment even though the sun is out too)

More about bread

On Tuesday I saw that we were almost out of bread so I decided I better get busy. My recipe originally takes only one day but when I made it the last time it ended up having big holes, desired by the REAL artists, but I don’t like stuffing the holes with butter so that the jam won’t drop on my lap through the holes, it happened often enough before, so I thought I’d try doing it in 2 days.

The recipe calls for a first mix of the ingredients then a wait of 15 minutes and after that with the dough hook installed another mix of 5 minutes. After the first mix I was just going to check something on my iPad but got waylaid by the TV and after an episode of Perry Mason I finally remembered my 15 minute dough 🤓 I rushed to the kitchen and did the dough hook thing. Unfortunately when I wanted to get the result in my oiled bowl for it’s overnight rise in the fridge my hands got more or less glued to the dough. It was a horrible experience but in the end I won without too much loss of the dough and it went into the fridge. 

The next morning I was able to shape it and let it rise again. 

Here is the result: just normal little crumb 😁 and the taste is excellent. Proof of that is that it is already half gone 😩. We went from eating no bread to this much after I started making sourdough bread.

Life is good 🤗

Rain and memory

While I was sitting in the living room this morning looking at the rain come down I knew I should be happy about it but at the same time I did not like seeing it. I prefer to see our beautiful green trees in the sunlight. I am glad our garden is getting the benefit of the rainwater rather than just the well water. Living in the country and using a well at least the water has no added chlorine. 

With nothing better to do I began thinking about my youth. 

When I was in high school we had classes on Saturdays too, running from 8 AM to 1 PM.  Sometimes the last period was cancelled but on those  days I did not go home and my best friend and I wandered around the Saturday market especially to the bakery stands. They made delicious pastry called “Amerikaner” moist base and a lemon glaze. To me they tasted to die for. So we bought lots of those and ate one after the other until we were full to overflow. Of course when I got home lunch was on the table and I had to eat that too unless I wanted to confess, which I did not want to do since that would spoil my other Saturday adventures. 

On one of those days my girlfriend stuck her finger in one of the pastries held it up in the air and asked the salesman  “how much is it?” Then after he told her the price she put it back down and said “too expensive” I thought the salesman exploded he was so mad. Of course she always planned to buy it and we went away munching and thinking it was a good joke. Now I am not so sure how good it was 😉

That’s all for now

Life is good!

Big annoyance today

Sorry to write this but it might be a warning to other people.
We buy lots of bananas and keep some in our cold room and put some in a glass bowl on the dining room table. Sometimes the bowl is pretty full with other fruit and yesterday we had too many already soft bananas which the one who will not be named placed on the placemat next to the bowl. This morning I was able to put the bananas in the bowl and needed to straighten the placemat (OCD kicking in) but it was stuck to our beautiful oak dining table 😩 . Pulling it off I saw that there were  lots of whitish spots imbedded in the wood. I almost had a heart attack because something similar happened once when I placed part of a banana that I was eating on my dresser for only a short while and to this date the outline is still visible 😭
I used lemon oil and some other wood cleaner today and a lot came out but there are still spots that I have to live with. So people be careful where you stash your bananas 👍😉

I hope tomorrow I can write a more pleasant post.
Like Janna always says...
Life is good! (I think I will adopt that!)

Flowers and flours

Here are my flowers

And here is my flour project

I just want to try the new Blogger format.

My roadside flower arrangement

I love these types of bouquets 😁

My Mother taught me…

 

There are many things my mother taught me but one thing that really stuck with m is:

Only touch something you do once if you can help it. An example of that is getting undressed at night. If you plan on wearing the same thing tomorrow, hang it up or fold it at once. Don’t put it down first because you just have to handle it twice, using time and energy. I don’t always follow that advice but most of the time I do.

I was thinking of that when I was doing dishes today, still by hand. I never put down a dish after drying it except for it’s proper resting place J

Another thing drilled into my mind when I was young…Always wear an apron when you work in the kitchen. I still do that and feel almost naked when I don’t have my apron on.

So much we learn as children gets carried on into adulthood.

Be polite, say hello to the people you meet and try to treat others as you would like to be treated.

Sometimes all of that is hard to follow but as long as we do our best things should be OK.

Those were just a few thoughts I had while doing dishes