Simple Pleasures

Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse -- and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness --
And Wilderness is Paradise enow. -- Omar Khayyam

Anyone who walks into our home immediately recognizes the centrality of good and hearty food. Lissa, my beloved wife, is always cooking and enjoys sharing with family and friends. We love peasant fare because it feeds soul as well as body. It is a small indulgence. A breakfast setting with brioche and vin de table is one near to heaven and one should to send you out into the world with a positive outlook.



Not every baker can produce artisan bread and not every artisan bread deserves the label. It is the product of a craftsperson carefully trained and well experienced using specific ingredients to produce refined and substantial bread.

Authentic artisan bread is indentified by its ingredients. The most common is limited to flour, water, salt and yeast. Sourdough breads include no yeast. Flavored breads must use recognizable ingredients such as milk, butter and eggs as is true of viennoiserie breads such as brioche (in spite of its French origins). No chemicals or preservatives.

Artisan bakeries are not factories. Anyone could witness the process of baking from beginning to finished product by taking a few small steps around a comfortable baking environment.

The key to taste remains locked in ingredients and fermentation. Variation in the latter produces a range from light and delicate to dark and rustic.



Table wine needn't be expensive to be good. Five or ten dollars carefully invested can secure something nice indeed. I must admit a preference for reds and also to being equally enamored with French and Italian wines that, in the company of my beloved, never fail to transport me to the French countryside or sunny Tuscany.