This morning I had a few baking projects going at once. They were multistep recipes, and it seemed to make sense to skip from one to another while this one was resting, that one was rising, the one over there was soaking, and the other was in the oven. But when it came time to put the sandwich bread in its earthenware bowl to rise, the dough tasted a little flat to me. This was my new favorite sourdough, and I knew it was off, but why?
Years ago I heard a folk tale about a vain king who asks his daughters how much they love him.
"More than all my gold and jewels," the oldest replies.
"More than all my beaus and pretty dresses," the middle daughter tells him.
His youngest pauses before answering. "I love you like the salt in my bread," she says, "no more and no less."
The king is offended by this answer, and he banishes his daughter, ordering her to leave the palace the next morning. That night, the princess sneaks down to the kitchen, and asks the cook to leave the salt out of her father's bread.
After his first bite at breakfast the next morning, the king summons the cook to his dining table and demands to know what is wrong with the bread. "Your highness, it has no salt," he is informed, and he understands the lesson immediately.
That's what was wrong with my bread, too. In my multitasking, I had forgotten to add the salt. Fortunately, I was able to knead in some flaky sea salt and salvage the loaf, grateful for the reminder about love.
What a great story, and so good you remembered that folk tale. My daughter bought a bread-making machine many years ago, but something was wrong with her first efforts. When she went back over the ingredients, she saw she'd left out the salt, because I tend not to use salt when cooking, and she realized that baking is different from cooking meals.
ReplyDeleteI love the nested story within this slice! I hadn't heard this tale before and it's funny how it came back to you as you baked this morning! Glad you could set things to right!
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