Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast

April 2, 2025

...ring the heady artisan baking uprising of the early teens. I had seen this book at the library but never bothered to check it out. With a few free days of house sitting for friends, I decided to dive into Forkish’s recipes. The book is divided into four parts: recipes that use commercial yeast, recipes that use a sourdough starter (or levain), pizza and a section on doughs that combine sourdough starter and commercial yeast. I’ve never tried this...

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Do I Need Books?

Mr. Homegrown

May 30, 2018

Domesticus, Tidying up

24 Comments

...ary doesn’t have and that I think I will read someday. Which are reference books or cookbooks that we regularly use. These latter books I will keep but could probably do without (I lack the iron will of Fumio Sasaki). Interestingly, I’ve found myself reading more now that I can’t access my books. Three days a week I go to the YMCA which is mere steps from the vast Los Angeles Central Library. I can, pretty much, find any book I want there. I also...

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How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy

Mr. Homegrown

May 13, 2019

Reviews, Thoughtstylings

3 Comments

...l know how these “influencer” nightmares play out. If you’re looking for a book about how to be more productive in a world of Facebook notifications, text messages and endless emails How to Do Nothing, despite the deceptive subtitle ain’t that book. But, perhaps, that’s the point. Maybe the problem with our culture is the need to “be productive,” to live in the myth of endless growth on a planet with finite resources. Central to Odell’s book is Wa...

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I Built a Set of Gerritt Rietveld Crate Chairs and So Can You

Mr. Homegrown

November 30, 2020

Design

3 Comments

...shelf, can be made with a few hand tools. The rest of the projects in this book would require a table saw and varying levels of skill. The book contains measured drawings for all the projects and tips on how Rietveld did the joinery as well as colors and finishes. If I had a modernist house or office I’d go crazy and make everything in this book. Pro tip: learn even a modest amount of carpentry skills and you can have furniture by famous designers...

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How to make your soup wonderful: Wild food soup stock

Mrs. Homegrown

March 26, 2013

Food, Food Preservation, Foraging, How-to

6 Comments

...ood, but go on to make really good stuff with it. One of their websites is Urban Outdoor Skills, and I like to go there to check out a section called the Food Lab, where they talk about food products they’re experimenting with, and give how-to’s. A few months ago Erik brought home a beautiful bouquet of nettles. I decided to try one of the Food Lab projects that intrigued me — Wild Food Soup Stock Preserved with Salt. This is no more than a bunch...

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