Word Count: 4143 | Reading Time: 14 min
Part 1: All the Time in the World
As long as there have been rules, there have been rule breakers. As long as there have been rules about time, there has been me, laughing at those rules. A maverick; a rebel with a pair of those round shades that are so good-looking you’re almost afraid to buy them because if you don’t look cool in them, then it will confirm your worst fears that there is no hope of you achieving true cooldom. (And you’d be right.) You say we can’t go back in time? I say, HA! You say we can’t exist in yesterday and today simultaneously? I say, hullo, I’m already there, and here. You say tomorrow never comes? I say, every day is today and every second is now… so, technically, you’re correct about that one.
I have seen the end of the world. It is not like an approaching train. You don’t see it coming. One minute you’re walking to the grocery store, wondering what frozen dinner you’d like to pick up; the next minute the dinner, the shop, and you are all gone. You won’t have time to react or prepare, much less to prevent it. Well, unless you’re me. I wouldn’t call myself a hero but sometimes, one just has to step up—especially if you’re the only one that can reverse the end of the world.
If you tell someone, ‘These pancakes are delicious!’, there is a 73% chance they will respond with an explanation of how they made it. You see, humans always have this need to know and explain how things work. While not in itself an unworthy goal, it is possible for this to cause some damage, for instance, burning your fingers because you want to know if the pan (which is on the hob) is hot, finding out your partner is cheating on you, or discovering the particle that could explain the mysteries of life on this planet, only to accidentally disturb the very fine balance (which, to be fair, you didn’t realise was so fine because you hadn’t gotten to that part of your discoveries yet) and cause the end of the world as we know it.
That is exactly what happened. The world ended—will have ended?—I never know what to say in these tense situations. Regardless, if I hadn’t intervened: no world. You’re welcome. The end of the world took less than a second. But that was plenty of time for me to put a stop to it.
The best plans are the simplest plans, said no one who ever came up with a decent plan! Still, I did manage to boil mine down to two key elements: bird and bread. The human baker would be important too, and the grudge-holding ducks.
Getting the bird to love bread was easy. Sowing discord between her and the ducks was a little tricky. The hardest by far was the bit with the roof—it isn’t easy to get a badelyng of ducks to act predictably.
Then came the matter of the bread. It is said that an infinite number of monkeys, given infinite time with a typewriter, will eventually write Hamlet. It is much quicker to get someone to drop something on a spot of your choice. A little more time for someone to drop something edible on that spot. Longer, but still faster than monkeys writing great tragedies, for that something edible to be a baked good. A baguette, for instance.
Like I said, time has never been a problem for me. If I want, I can just go back and do things over until they’re exactly the way I want them to be. Of course, I didn’t really need to go back too much because—and this may be difficult to hear—humans are painfully predictable. You lot think you’re so clever, each one believing yourself to be the only one doing things differently or bestowing uniquely funny quips on everyone, when the truth is, you’re all the same. You all want to be photographed pretending to hold the sun like a basketball. You all secretly believe no one understands you. You all think that pressing the button again will make the lift come faster.
The human I picked is called Edhas and he had started a project. He was baking, in order, all the 273 recipes from Cake Cookie Bread by Gingembre Paine. Paine, having lost her home and family in a flood, had moved into a tiny house in the French countryside and dedicated her life to baking bread, quickly moving on from well-known recipes to making up new ones. Two years later, Paine self published Cake Cookie Bread. No one knew her real name. The book had sold 114 copies since its release, when Edhas had impulsively bought the book from a second-hand bookshop on the day that he had lost his job. He quickly came to believe that Gingembre Paine was a genius. The day after he bought the book—his first unemployed day—Edhas baked the first recipe in the book. He was astounded by how well the ‘Basic White’ bread had turned out. He quickly decided to undertake the 273-recipe project and began filming himself making each recipe, uploading the videos on YouTube under the channel Ed & Bread.
Good things take time—whether it’s getting to know a pigeon, baking a baguette, or coming up with a foolproof way to save the world. The end of the world is like an approaching train. Provided you have a good plan, the schedule can be altered.
Part 2: A Life in Three Slices
1
My first encounter with bread is also my most delicious encounter with bread.
I was a young squab at the time, not much to look at, and always hungry! I was flying over my second favourite waste bin (my favourite waste bin is the one behind the chip shop near my house— ALWAYS full!), when I saw it. Right there, between a flattened tomato and a mottled leaf, lay the beautiful brioche. Not just a slice, a complete loaf! AND, as if that wasn’t good enough, it was teeming with juicy black ants. I love pecking away at ants and watching them scatter. Food-on-the run is very underrated.
Now, I had heard of bread before, and I had seen other pigeons enjoying it. (My best friend’s cousin apparently found bread on a windowsill above his house every single day. Who puts bread on a windowsill! What a place for bread to be!) I have since become something of an expert on bread, but back then I hadn’t really come face to face with it. Until the brioche.
I must have been on my way to the beach to tease some gulls—my favourite hobby—I don’t remember for certain. All I remember is eating that brioche. The only time I stopped was to make room for more brioche. That is a delicate way of saying I pooped. It was sweet and soft—the brioche, not my poop (although, poop is also soft. I wonder what it tastes like!)—not too dry, not too mushy; a little tough and a little squishy. I had found my favourite thing to do. I wanted to spend as much of my life as possible pursuing and eating bread.
2
What my second story lacks in brioche, it makes up for in nemeses. This is tale two.
I had had a long day. So many people said “shoo!” at me, and I was even driven away from the chip shop! I decided to rest a bit by a lake before heading home. All I could think of was getting back to the comfort of my rooftop. I love my home!
I know what you’re thinking. There’s nothing remarkable about that, Dr Bread, everyone loves their home. To which I say, thank you for that nickname! I’ve always wanted one. And of course, you’re right. What I meant was, if I’m away from home for too long, I grow restless. I can picture my house even when it isn’t in front of me and, no matter where I am, I can always find my way back. As I sat by the lake, all I wanted was to be home. And to eat something.
I got lucky! Someone had dropped half a sesame bun by the side of the lake. Clumsy people are my favourite. Clumsy people who don’t pick up after themselves, even more so. I swooped down and was SO CLOSE to the bun when—
QUACK!
A nasty shelduck shamelessly made off with my lunch! Now, I am not proud of what I did next. Also, ducks are scary so I don’t recommend it. Their beaks can make quite a dent in a pigeon’s bottom. I know that now. OK fine, I knew that back then too. But my hunger had clouded my judgement. And, as we’ve established, baked goods are my weakness. I swerved mid-air and followed my bun to that thieving duck who, understandably startled, began to swim away. I sped up, got in front of the duck, and plucked the bun right out of his beak. Then, I quickly flew away. All the way home.
3
The third story is incomplete because I am still in the middle of it. You’ll soon see what I mean.
Today was a hot day and I’d spent the morning hopping around a fountain—getting soaked, drying my feathers, getting soaked again. The best kind of day! As the sun began to melt on the horizon, I started to fly home. I was in a good mood, so I was singing really loudly:
The wind in my wing makes me sing
The breeze in my knees makes me sneeze
The cloud in my mouth takes me south
I was singing so loudly that I was nearly home before I heard them. And then I saw them. My rooftop was full of ducks. Ducks? On a rooftop? On my rooftop! Oh no, they had spotted me! Ever since the sesame bun incident, all ducks really had it out for me. I couldn’t go anywhere without having to look over my shoulder for lurking ducks. If they happened to be nearby, they would shoot me death glares or waddle towards me menacingly. I hate them so much! But I was also scared of them.
So I turned around, flying away from home, as a dozen ducks quacked loudly as if to say ‘yes, you better fly!’ I flew towards a large shiny building I could see in the distance. I was but a few wing flaps away when I sensed something. Something bread-ey.
It didn’t take me long to spot the baguette, peeping out from behind a heavy, round door. It was just 6
what I needed to make me feel better. It had seeds all over, which I love! Especially flaxseeds although there weren’t too many of those. I stood right there and started pecking at it. I pecked away the soreness of my wings. I pecked away my confusion about the ducks on the roof. I pecked away at how much I missed my home. Then, I fell asleep.
Now I have woken up. I’m still not home, but the baguette—the only thing that has made me feel better—is still with me. Some of it. I need to figure out a way to get rid of the ducks from my house. But I can do that tomorrow. Tonight, I will take the bread and myself somewhere safe.
Part 3: Waiting for Dough
Hullo there! Welcome to the twenty-fourth episode—er, video—of Ed & Bread. I am Ed, and in every video, I make one recipe from this book, whose name I don’t say because I don’t know whether I’m meant to ignore the crossed-out words or not. The book is by Gingembre Paine— always feel pretentious when I say that, heh. Uh, I, uh, don’t know anything about Paine—which is why I call them ‘they’—but I do know that they are an absolute genius chef and writer.
Today, I’m going to make a baguette aux graines, which is a seeded baguette. In the previous video, we made a baguette au chocolat, which was the chocolate baguette; before that, a baguette ordinaires, or a standard baguette. Now, this is very similar to both of those, but I will make it from scratch again, just in case you haven’t watched those other videos. Well, only 23 of you have seen those, so. Actually, some of those views might be mine—to check the lighting and things. Anyway, um, it’s baguette time. Again. Maybe I should have done these recipes in a different order, but it’s like an album, you know: the order in which it’s published was chosen for a purpose, and you can never have too much baguette. So, let’s get started. As usual, the recipe is very straightforward and doesn’t need any fancy gadgets, so do try it at home.
I haven’t laid out all my ingredients like I usually do because, you may have noticed, I’m in a smaller kitchen today. I did mention in one of the previous videos that I’d have to move into a smaller apartment because I couldn’t afford to keep paying rent. But my new place has a good kitchen, as you can see, and the slabs are white which might actually provide for better ingredient visibility.
We start with the yeast. Two grams in five grams of water, and wait to make sure it’s alive and well. You know how to do this by now. For this recipe, we will use a mixture of whole wheat flour and plain flour. What! We’ve never done that before. That’s right, we’re stepping up our flour power. Now, I’m taking 200 grams of plain flour and 100 grams of whole wheat flour because, let’s admit it, the plain flour tastes at least twice as good. Then we mix them up so we can’t tell them apart — that’s how society should be, everyone friendly and together. Oh, wait, I just remembered what I said about white flour being better. Ig-ignore that. And the society bit—it was a misguided metaphor. Oh, oh look, the flour is mixed and now we can add a teeny tiny bit of salt. Say, three pinches. One, two, there! Sorry, salt, didn’t mean to pinch you so many times ha ha. [pause] Now we mix in the water or, as Paine writes, ‘inculcate the moisture’. Little by little, until it starts to look a bit doughy—which is not an insult when you say it about dough but can be hurtful when using it to describe a person, if even if they have put on weight because of, say, a new project which involves a lot of bread-eating.
Er, you can use a spatula to mix it all up. Not mix, combine. Don’t–you’re not meant to mix it, that’s made very clear in the book. Cover it and keep it away for 45 minutes. So, I’m stopping the camera, unless you want to watch me clean my windowsill of pigeon poop again ha ha. [pause] I guess not. See you?
***
I’m back. But only for a bit. Let’s take a look at that dough. Oh, yes, that’s lovely, isn’t it? All we’re going to do is fold it, like this. I think this is just to air it out a bit—like an old blanket but much better smelling… and edible. Or, well, not yet. OK that’s it. Now we cover it and leave it for 45 minutes again. We have to do this four times, so strap in. It must be nice having someone checking in on you every 45 minutes, no?
***
Hi again, it’s been 45 more minutes. 45 minutes is a long time! They should change ‘a watched pot doesn’t boil’ to ‘watched dough doesn’t rise, especially if it’s covered’ hahaha. Let’s have a look at it. Whoa! It’s getting bigger. Again, just fold, easy and gentle. That’s it. See you after 45 minutes. Last 45-minute wait!
***
Hullo! Meet my fat friend Fernando. Fernan-dough, get it? These are the jokes you get if you leave me alone for 45 minutes. Look how fat! Again, fold fold fold and bye bye bye. THIS is the last 45- minute wait. I misspoke earlier.
***
I should have started this baguette in the morning. I barely got any sleep last night, and with all of this 45-minute resting, it is now 11pm, and the dough is still, well, dough. Let’s see how much it’s risen. Oh WOW! That’s pretty good actually. Let’s fold it again because why not.
OH, extra step alert! Take a wild guess what this seeded baguette has that other baguettes do not. 9
SEEDS! And some honey. We’re supposed to roast the seeds, which I suppose I could have done while waiting but I forgot. You can pick your seeds. I got a box of mixed seeds from the shop. Um, but I don’t like flaxseeds so I had to pick them all out which was a pretty fun way to spend an afternoon actually, but you might want to avoid it. OK, so roast the seeds. That means the pan must be dry and hot. Now, keep them moving so they don’t burn—true for seed-roasting, true for life. Can you see the smoke coming out? That’s a good thing, that means it’s happening. But turn it off in time so it doesn’t burn. Basically, burning it is the only thing you can do wrong. I once made peanut butter with burned peanuts, and it looked awful. Still tasted pretty good. OK these are done.
Now sprinkle and fold the seeds in, along with 15 grams of honey. Gingembre Paine says to ‘hide it like a Christmas present, then look for it, then hide it again, until you don’t see it anymore’. That’s for the honey; I don’t think that will work with the seeds.
All right, enough chitchat. Let’s work quicker before it’s time for my morning coffee. The dough is ready. So, clear the area and sprinkle flour on it. Then pour the dough out, and flour it. And now we sing our flour song:
Sprinkle sprinkle, roll roll
Get that dough out of the bowl
It’s not yet bread. That’s what I said!
So do the old sprinkle-roll.
Does this song count as a catchphrase? I feel like I need a catchphrase. If you have any catchphrase suggestions, comment in the video and I will try and incorporate them in my next video. Now, divide the dough into four equal parts. One firm and decisive knife motion. And again. That’s pretty good. These two are a little bigger than those but that’s OK. Baguettes come in all shapes and sizes.
Now, we pre-shape. We’ve done this many times before. I should make up a song for this too. Pre-shape the dough
Like this, like so—
[pause] I’ll work on the song.
Now we cover them, this time with a lightly oiled lid. And then, guess what? More waiting. Only 15 minutes this time.
***
OK welcome back. It is shaping time! We’ve performed this before. It’s the regular baguette shaping motion. Watch carefully: roll, fold over, seal, roll, aaaaaand, done.
Second one. Roll, fold, seal, roll, fold, seal, roll. Finished. Third, this is exciting isn’t it. I was so nervous while shaping my first baguette and look at me now. Fourth. Talking all the way through the shaping. Multitasking like a pro.
EXTRA STEP ALERT! I know you’re all waiting for couche time but first, spray your almost baguettes with water, and proceed to sprinkle the seeds on. These do not have to be roasted, or toasted, whatever it was. Just raw seeds. Raw seeds? Is that a thing?
Oh, they look lovely. Or diseased. Eye of the beholder. And now we let them lie down. They’ve had a long day and might have seed-rashes. So, now we take our couche. You can, like Paine and like me, use a clean pillowcase. But any cloth is fine, really. Place your baguettes one by one. A little fold in the middle so they don’t have to fight for space. Oh that looks comfortable! Sprinkle some flour. Cover with a towel — I call it their blanket — and let the gentle calmness of sleep wash over them. Aaah. Excuse me. Made myself yawn there, what with this calming atmosphere. See you in twenty minutes.
***
Hi again! I was revising the next steps while waiting and you’ll never guess what comes next. No, not waiting. Preheating the oven! And then… waiting. 480ºF, 30 minutes. See ya. ***
It’s nearly oven time so let’s look at those languishing baguettes. Whoa! They grow up so fast. [sniff] It’s time to bake them.
First, we score them. Out of ten haha. You know what scoring means. Take your sharpest knife, wet it, and remember, don’t overthink the cuts. Quick and decisive. One, two. Next. One, two. Oh, knocked some seeds out. That’s all right. Third one. One, two. And the last baguette. One, two. Wait, is that a flaxseed? Oh man!
OK, anyway, remember the trick we discussed last video? For a crispier crust, I will now place a tray of boiling water at the bottom of the oven. And also, lightly spray water over the baguettes. There we go! And now we place the baguettes on the tray, and in the oven. We’re going to bake it for twenty-two minutes. I’m just going to sit here and watch them rise. You’re welcome to join me. [pause] But I will probably edit it out.
***
Moment of truth—always wear oven mitts for this part. I’m just taking out the tray and placing it on the counter. Close the oven door and—WOW. That looks incredible! I have to wait for it to cool, which is fine because I have a job interview tomorrow and need to get at least a few hours of sleep before that.
I will leave you with this lovely image. Thank you for baking with me and for waiting with me. If you do try this at home, leave a comment below to tell me how it turned out. And, as always, if anyone knows anything about Gingembre Paine, I would love to hear from you. ***
Guys, I know the video is over, but I am recording this extra message because I have some news. I got a job! Not my ideal job, not what I’m used to, but it would be great to have a steady income again. And I must admit that the building is very fancy. The reason I am telling you this is that I took the baguette aux graines to work today, something to share with my new colleagues, but it fell! So, I didn’t get to taste how it turned out, and I think maybe we’ll make the seeded baguette again in the next episode, er, video. The floor was pretty clean, and I guess I could have brought it back home and eaten it myself, but I panicked and ran away. I hope no one figures out that it’s me. Anyway, it’s just a baguette—no harm done, really. Good night!
Baguette Dropped From Bird’s Beak Shuts Down The Large Hadron Collider (Really)
By STUART FOX| PUBLISHED NOV 5, 2009 (popsci.com)
[…]
The bird dropped some bread on a section of outdoor machinery, eventually leading to significant over heating in parts of the accelerator. The LHC was not operational at the time of the incident, but the spike produced so much heat that had the beam been on, automatic failsafes would have shut down the machine.
This incident won’t delay the reactivation of the facility later this month, but exposes yet another vulnerability of the what might be the most complex machine ever built. With freak accident after freak accident piling up over at CERN, the idea of time traveling particles returning from the future to prevent their own discovery is beginning to seem less and less far fetched.