I'm in the strange position of having come about 180 degrees.  Totally and completely changed my opinion.

Now you might expect that I'm talking about something serious.  Like, 'I think that higher education is a waste of time.'  Or maybe, 'I was a christian and now I'm an atheist.'  Or even, 'I once thought that we were destroying our world but now I think that no polar bears, an acidic ocean and going to any and all lengths to extract oil from the planet is actually doing the whole eco-system a huge favour.'

Well, I'm not talking about any of those things.

I'm talking about yeast.

You see, it wasn't too long ago that just the word yeast sent me running from the kitchen.  You might have found me curled up in a ball on my bed rocking slightly and biting my finger nails profusely.  I would avoid using recipes with yeast entirely.  It's embarrassing and frustrating having a recipe flop after you've waited 4 hrs to finish it.  Yeast is like that though, especially if you don't know what it's all about and/or you want perfect results every single time.  This blog, however,  has given me a reason to decide to get past my phobia once and for all.  The quest itself has produced a most interesting result though.  I am now resolved - RESOLVED - to find bread recipes that a) Will work.  and b) Will be interesting.  I find myself avoiding the bread isle (the few times I've found myself in a grocery store of late).  I refuse to order the wonderful organic, multi-grain bread that we can get through our food box.  Sometimes, I discover that I actually want to make dough.  I search out bread recipes that look both interesting and healthy.  To seal the deal I've recently bought yeast in larger quantities than the packets that you get at the grocery store.  Yup.  This thing is serious.


I'm also in the enviable position of having received a gift.  I know that many of us were receiving gifts (some more than others) quite recently but this gift is different for me.  This gift is right up my alley  - a foodie gift I guess you could say.  One of the teachers that I work with brought me a gift of flour.  Red Fife flour to be exact.  It's beautiful.  It's a fine flour with a slightly pinkish/red tinge to it.  From what I can gather Red Fife is a strain of wheat that a farmer by the name of Fife began to grow around a hundred and fifty years ago.  Red Fife has the ability to adapt itself to widely varying growing conditions making it ideal for the colder Canadian climate.  It is classified as a Heritage Wheat.  This is all very exciting for me.  I didn't know how best to use it so was doing a lot of searching for recipes.  I found that most were pretty much using Red Fife mixed with all purpose and the results were great.  So, when I saw this recipe at 101cookbooks I knew I had to try it with Red Fife flour.  It had all the elements that I was looking for and it even uses carrots.  Too cool.


The result was better than I had hoped for.  A great bread.  Looks beautiful with these flecks of carrot scattered throughout.  Has a lovely crumb and the shape is fantastic.  Once the dough itself got made it was extremely low maintenance as well.  If you don't have Red Fife (and not many of us do at the moment) then use whole wheat or rye flour and it will do nicely.


So what once simultaneously terrified, embarrassed and eluded me has become the very thing that I run to for interest, solace and satisfaction.  A nice way to start a new year I'd say.