This might be the best tasting bread that ever came out of our kitchen. If Peter Reinhart calls it “my all time favorite bread” you know it must be good. Check out the swirls of cinnamon in that beautiful raisin bread dough. The recipe includes quite a list of grains: polenta, oats, wheat germ, wheat flour, brown rice. And if you read the story of the bread, you know that it was meant to be made for today, September 29, Michaelmas. It is a harvest bread, celebrating the many grains of the harvest. But it celebrates more than that. The original blessing of the bread starts with this wonderful language “each meal beneath my roof, they will all be mixed together…” That language struck me as I mixed together all of those grains this morning. Every grain, every meal, every person with whom we break bread-they all get mixed together into the fabric of our loaves and the fabric of our lives. As I kneaded the dough I was grateful for all of them. As I rolled it out I realized that each grain had its own shape and texture, but they were all necessary to get the perfect dough. It made me think about all the things that make us each unique, and the ways that we are so much better when we come together. So I am grateful tonight. For the smell of cinnamon lingering in my kitchen. For warm bread and butter with my son after school. For the family and friends I break bread with almost every day. For the kids I bake with on Friday afternoons. For the supporters who buy our breads and donate funds to keep our programs running. They are all part of the Little Flour mix, just like all the grains that go into the Struan. So while the Struan recipe is perfect exactly as written, I think part of what made it taste so good today was the gratitude that went into it. Its another one of those intangible ingredients that make all the difference in baking. Try it yourself and see what you think.
