Hey all:
Pam, take a second look at the Smart Car - until last year it was diesel, but now uses reg gas, so the fuel savings aren't as great as they were. Still good though. Glad to see you back too.
Someone earlier was talking about the price of bread, what with all the truck haulage of grain now. Well, here the "artisan" breads have already gone up to 5 or 6 bucks (or more) a loaf!! Probably double what they were a couple years ago. Since I pretty much dislike the regular grocery store breads, you can imagine that I'm not eating a whole lot of bread these days!! I guess it'll be good for my waistline . . .*sigh*
Gas was at $1.25.2 when I topped up mid-last week, but haven't been out to see what it is this weekend.
Price of Gas .....
Cyber: I was at a local market yesterday, and they had a barrel of hard red spring wheat, the kind you would use to make bread. It was 1.00 per pound. Hubby said that would be like $60.00 a bushel!!!!!
I have noticed that the price of flour has gradually crept up. I very rarely buy bread. I have had a breadmaker for years, and make 100% whole wheat bread from 100% whole wheat flour. I have never calculated how much it costs to make a loaf, but I'm pretty sure I've more than paid for the machine now, so just the cost of the ingredients and the electricity. Not too much! Bread machines are getting a lot cheaper. I bought them for both my kids for Xmas at 50.00 each. Hmmm......how many artisan breads would pay for that machine??
Just my two cents worth, a former Prairie wheat farmers wife!
Glenda
Hi Glenda:
I have a bread machine too, and have been fooling around with recipes trying to get the proportions of whole wheat flour and other stuff right so that I don't end up with doorstops Whole wheat can be a non-riser if it's not mixed with either another flour or some other stuff I can't remember the name of right now. (I'm beat from weeding and planting on the roof, but feel so good to be getting that under way)
I'd been trying to find a book on bread-making chemistry so I could work it out better, and couldn't find anything - not even after asking chefs and bakers! My brother found one and I got it for Christmas last year, and by thunderin', you need an engineering degree and a huge wall chart to figure it out!
So many days I'm just so tired though, with this CP&CFS, that I just don't get to making anything.
But the bread is getting closer to what I want as I monkey more and more.
~marilyn
Reg gas here $1.31.9 Thanks Marilyn! :)
Gots my bread machine running lots lately as well. Marilyn and Glenda please do share those whole wheat recipes with me. I've been baking and loving white for years but it's time to start eating healthier. Oh yes my son's back to Uni gift will be a bread maker! ;)
This message was edited May 25, 2008 6:01 PM
Because of our elevation (maybe?) I bake all my bread machine bread in the oven. Just doesn't seem to work in the breadmachine. So mine is permanently set on the dough setting and YUMMY!!! Whole grain, rye, sourdough, foccachia as well as french white mmmmmmmmm homemade bread mmmmmmmm.
Okay, here goes with my recipe:
1½ cups warm water(I use QUITE warm!)
2 tablespoons dry milk powder(I keep this in the freezer-I've had it go bad on me!)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
1½ teaspoons salt
3 tablespoons molasses
1 tablespoon honey
On top of that, put 3 3/4 cups whole wheat flour and 4 teaspoons of flax meal. You can also add 1 tablespoon of gluten if you wish. I stopped using it, as I found it just didn't make a difference. Might be different at higher elevations??
Make a well in the centre, and add 1 3/4 teaspoons of yeast. I just use regular dry yeast, and keep it in the freezer. I just finished up a container that I've had for over two years. I find I need to watch at the beginning and make sure the dough is a good consistency. Most often, I have to add a bit more flour to make the dough smooth.
I always use the quick setting on my breadmaker, as I find it makes a better loaf.
That's it folks!
oooooooo thanks ggd. I need to add more water rather than more flour (I can tell the adjustment by the look of the doughball too) and less yeast to adjust for the elevation. I agree I haven't found any difference with gluten.
Thanks Glenda :) Looking great but like Dahlianut I'll have to adjust it a wee bit
Gluten - that's it! It did make some small difference for me, but something else I tried last time made more difference, and I can't remember what it was right now.
Also, I think I may have gotten the wrong kind of wheat. Now that I see how many kinds of wheat there are, I'll make sure I'm getting what's best for bread.
But even if it's a bit dense, I do love my bread machine.
I have read on the Rogers flour bag in the past something about adding lemon juice to bread mix. Not sure what that would do, but might have to find some info on that!
up yesterday to $1.39.9. :(
And the Americans down here (I've been in AZ and UT for the last 2 1/2 weeks) are moaning because it's (just) over $4.00/gallon.
Ann
yes but that's their gallon which is more like $5 our gallon which is pretty close to what wer are paying
Big jump today, to $1.469/L. At 4 L to the gallon, in CDN$ would be $5.868.
OUCH! That makes our $1.349/L look like a bargain (almost).
$1.349/litre at 4.54609188 litres/imperial gallon is $6.132/imperial gallon. So, Ontarians on average are paying $6.132 Canadian per Canadian gallon. I think that the introduction of the metric system was the best thing that could ever have happened to the oil companies. $1.349 a litre sounds a whole lot more palatable than $6.132 a gallon, doesn't it?
d'accord
And when I was in the US lately, you should have heard the moaning about $4.00/gallon gas! Mind you, their gallon is much closer to 4 litres.
I also agree that the metric system was the best thing to happen. but not so much about buying gasoline as about cooking. i moved here from the US when I got married and Canadian cooking measurements were a mess - a mishmash of Imperial and American measurements, usually using American measuring utensils.
Ann
You know, still to this day I can't get used to recipes in metric. I always convert them to Imperial - and I have no idea what litres/100km is in gas mileage, I have to stop and convert it to miles/gallon :-) Yet I've been subverted to degrees celsius. LOL Now when I get the temperature in degrees fahrenheit I ask, "So what's that in celsius?"
LOL GInny!
When I started my training (EEG TEchnology) back in the late 50's we did everything in metric - cms and mms was the order of the day! Still is. So I am quite comfortable with small metric. And when we converted from F to C I figured that one out easily with a helpful chart the Ottawa Citizen published and Im like you cant figure out F. But I still do longer distances in Imperial feet and miles still make more sense to me than metres and Km. Partly probably due to the fact that I did not have a car until fairly recently.
Ginny, I still am not into the metric thing either. Weird that both my kids are. My 35 year old daughter did not know how much a "foot" was!!!! Just our ages I guess!
Just filled up with gas. Took 60.00, and the car still had a 1/4 tank of gas!!!
Still 146.9 here.
Yes, at our ages we learned everything in Imperial. The only time I had anything to do with metric in my school days was when I took junior/senior high school science, and that was for small measurements.
Price of gas here has gone back down to 129.9. Still painful, but not quite as excruciating.
I paid $1.304/l today. I can't complain too much - looks cheaper here than some places....
Joanne
I'm 35 and learned only metric in school and only used ever used metric until I became an adult. It's funny how I switched over to imperial and how I learned it I'm not quite sure. Possibly when I started doing crafts and all the publications were from the US. I use feet and yards for measuring rooms and large spaces . I use metric for smaller measurements because I find mm and cm much easier than a eighth of an inch, quarter of an inch etc. For cooking, I only use imperial. I don't get farenheit at all. Funny how my brain works at times.
Gas is almost the same here Ginny. Seems Canada Post wants to investigate the rising gas prices to see how much it has to do with trading. Apparently, the letter carriers in rural areas are starting to pipe up because they use their own cars and are only paid approx $2000 per month for gas. They say they are now having to dip into their own pockets to make up the difference and quite naturally want Canada Post to be paying that. I hope rural delivery is not in jeopardy....yikes!
Here's a link to Pam's (Lilypon) recent posting about what makes up the price of gas http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/p.php?pid=5130192 .
Trading is quite possibly one of the main drivers behind the current phenomenon Erynne - in the form of rampant speculation and profit taking on the commodities exchange.
Up to 149.4 today. BC added a 2.4 cent carbon tax today.
I cringed in sympathy for you when I read about that in the newspapers. The pain goes on....
Up to 1.52 today!!! : - (
I think it won't be long until we're at a buck and a half too! $1.37 at our gas stn this morning.