You Don’t Always Get What You Want … But You Get What You Knead
A lot of us chainsaw-wielding menfolk around here are engaged in role reversals with the missus. Probably says more about rampant unemployment on the South End than it does gender bending, but when the women work to pay the mortgage on the shack, most of us lay-abouts realize a healthy marriage — not to mention physical well being — depends on us pitching in around the house. Cooking, laundry, dishwashing duty, basic cleaning chores go hand in hand with our more manly obligations now.
The reverse is true too. A lot of lady friends chop wood or repair their plumbing or push a lawnmower or throw a mean hammer. Part and parcel of living with one foot in poverty and the other in the 19th century. Gender roles get pretty blurry.
So it always surprises me when I take a savory potato salad or a loaf of fresh homemade bread to a potluck and the hosts compliment, without fail, the missus. I only been baking bread now, continuously, for 4o plus years. Got a grain grinder older than me attached to a curly maple butcher block table I made when I built the house designed just for that purpose. I grind wheat berries, rye, barley, oats, corn, quinoa, flax, amaranth, buckwheat, spelt and soybeans. It doesn’t get much fresher. Add some salt, some olive oil, plenty of molasses or brown sugar and let the yeast froth it up to something alive and kicking. Knead it, roll it, put it in a buttered pan, bake it for half an hour. Used to bake it in the wood cook stove and still do occasionally, but we got a gas one we use most of the time now.
A lot of the womenfolk ask if I use a breadmaker. Actually, they all ask. Just assume, I suppose, a He-Man like myself wouldn’t strap on an apron and grab a rolling pin. (Next thing they’ll have to imagine my thinning locks up in curlers.) Most of em sigh and say they always wanted to learn, maybe they could drop by for a hands-on lesson or two next time I’m in full knead mode. I say sure, but I know they won’t. Working women really don’t have enough free time. Maybe when they’re semi- retired …. like me. Besides, breadmaking is a little like magic. A good magician doesn’t give away the trick. And anyway, if they all started baking, what would I bring to the next potluck?
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