Poetry! Travel! To remind myself of these resolutions to read more and travel some, I have re-formatted my blog. All the readers who get my blogs directly by mail might like to make one visit to my blog site to see its new look (I should probably say 'avatar', which sounds more arty but 'look' will suffice, for the content has not changed).
Artisanal bread! I have bought a wonderful, new oven and my cast iron bread pan is on its way from Amazon. Ever since I read the book 'Tartine Bread', I have been introduced to a completely new world of bread and bread making. Of natural leavening, long rises, high hydration and at the end (one hopes) - crackling, crusty, flavourful loaves that keep well. I was so excited by this proposition that I decided to take the leap and buy a small sky blue charcoal grill called Smokey Joe (recently introduced by an American company in Bangalore). So Smokey Joe, Iron Mae (as I have named my bread pan) and I will spend long hours together, rollin' down the rough country road.
Growing my own salads! I hope to attempt growing a few simple leaves and vegetables, praying all the while that the monkeys don't get to them before I do. This is a biased experiment in studying plant-animal interactions. Yesterday I was delighted to see a bird hopping about amongst my pots in the garden, occasionally pecking at something on the leaves or in the soil, peering at the lotus pond and the bird bath (which no bird has used as of now!). It made me decide not to spray any strong chemicals on the plants or in the soil. This year, the aphids made their annual visit but I observed that just with a dose of good nutrients, the plants were able to survive the insect attack. So I will stick to organic gardening in the coming year.
Oh! And I totally forgot to include my resolution to do more 'real work' as well!
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