Janene (alias The Little Red Hen) decided that the wheat in the field across the street should not go to waste. I just thought they were weeds. She went over and picked a basket of wheat heads off the weeds and brought it home. She let it dry in our bedroom, and then she wrapped it in a sheet, whipped it around a few times, strained it to get the kernels out and finally brought our her hair dryer and blew all the chaff away, leaving only these healthy looking kernels.
She decided to do a bake and taste test with the real stuff from the store. Our weed wheat is the wheat on the right, the left side is hard red wheat from the store. She ground each up in our grinder and got enough flour to make two loaves of each kind. They both ground into good looking flour and both raised fine prior to cooking. Our weed wheat was a little lumpy in the dough form. Janene thinks it may not have as much gluten.
Both kinds baked up to the same color with no difference in baking times. Our weed bread is the one in front above. You can see it has a little bit of a lumpy look to it.
Here they are again. The weed bread is on the right and wheat bread on the left.
They both sliced up about the same and they both smelled heavenly. Just like Grandma's.
The texture of both breads is about the same, with our weed bread being just a little more crumbly, but not enough that you would be able to notice. A little bit of butter, honey and a glass of milk, and it was time to enjoy the Little Red Hen's feast. She was kind enough to share it with all of us. Now we know how to make bread from the weeds in the vacant lot across the street. I hope we don't ever really need to get our bread that way, but it is nice to know we can.
6 comments:
You crazy lady! I used to pick and eat that wheat when I was little. There's a good crop of it down in front of the Olney's house too. . . in case you need some more. :)
Janene, you never cease to amaze me. I can't think of a more resourceful person than you. It is truly inspiring.
I'm with Robin, I thought they were just weeds. I guess I'll starve staring at the weeds instead of eating delicious bread. Maybe I'll have to take some lessons.
Janene, you are absolutely awesome - and I think "Little Red Hen" is very apt! Bread looks great. After your blog about chili sauce, I mad some for myself. Tastes great...now I just need to know what to use it with! Let me know. It's peaches today, plus green beans and carrot freezing. Hope we can come to the pie get-together tonight.
That is simply amazing. Thanks so much for sharing. Just one more reason for us to be in awe of Janene.
I took some missionary photos for a kid in my ward in a field of wheat. When I told my husband I was going to do this he wondered where I was going to find a field of wheat. I told them they were everywhere, yup of course he thought they were just weeds. I knew it was wheat, but did I know it was usable wheat? No, but know I do.
Very, very amazing indeed. My mom told my Grandma about this and she said, "Janene would be a very useful lady to have around in desperate times."
Add this to the hundreds of other reasons why we are glad we know you. I know you are a little embarassed that Robin wrote about this, but I'm glad he did. It's a good thing to know about. Now we just need to learn how to do it. Sign me up for the lessons too.
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