Snoqualmie

Cottage industry: people making cottages.

I am, as Kristen has pointed out before, precisely one motherfucking baking machine.

There are the muffins, and cookies, and cakes, and gingerbread, and puddings, and more cookies. There are the casseroles and quiches. Now? Now there's bread. In the last week I've made two loaves of dark sweet wheat bread, one giant loaf of Pugliese (a round Italian country bread), and am currently working on a loaf of Polish rye bread. This brings my bread repertoire up to, well, some large quantity of breads. Split pan loaves, Grant loaves, naan, French bread, French wheat bread, crumpets, milk rolls, focaccia, onion bread, cheese and onion bread, and some random freestyle experiments that can be neither duplicated nor adequately explained. And as if that isn't enough, I fly in the face of American baking conventions and make it all vegan.

My roommate Katie has now turned me, as the title of this entry suggests, into a cottage industry. In the interest of frugality and deliciousness, she's contracted with me to fill her bread needs at $2 per loaf ($2.50 for loaves that require special ingredient purchases). I think I win the bad-at-business award for continually arguing for lower prices, but let's be honest, I don't have 30 years of baking experience and an every-loaf-perfect guarantee. I do, however, have a pretty good track record for the last week.

"Wouldn't you," Katie asked this afternoon while I kneaded rye dough, "like to do this for a living?" Just at this moment, I really can't imagine that a better idea has ever been vocalized since "let's see what happens if we evolve some legs around here".