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Tips For Bread Baking For Those Staying At Home

AILSA CHANG, HOST:

Take a trip to the grocery store and you may notice staple products are missing. For some people, that includes yeast - those little envelopes with the pellets that make bread rise.

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

And that presents a problem to some who are taking up baking as a new quarantine hobby. So we've got solutions.

BRAD LEONE: The basics sourdough recipe would just be flour, water and open air.

CHANG: Brad Leone hosts a video series for Bon Appetit, and he says there's an easy fix to the run on yeast - make your own sourdough starter. All you need to do is put flour and water in a bowl on the counter.

KELLY: Every now and again, add a little more flour and more water. Let it ferment. And soon you will have your own living, breathing sourdough starter.

LEONE: Essentially, you're doing a controlled rot of a food that has a beneficial value to it.

KELLY: You never need to buy yeast again because the starter has natural yeast in it.

CHANG: Francis Lam, who hosts the public radio program The Splendid Table, has plans for the more adventurous baker.

FRANCIS LAM: A recipe for beer bread - that is literally just flour with baking powder, a little bit of salt and a can of beer.

KELLY: Yeah, the carbonation will give the flour a little lift.

LAM: And because you're making it with beer, even though there's no yeast in the bread, you get a yeasty flavor from the beer. So it might scratch that flavor edge, too.

CHANG: But if these sound a bit too advanced for you and you still just want to buy some yeast, try your local bakery.

BRETT BORG: We are selling yeast, flour and sugar for customers to come to use in their own kitchens; avoid the grocery stores and come to a bakery to pick up that thing.

KELLY: Brett Borg is the co-owner of Schmidt's Pastry Cottage in South Jordan, Utah. The bakery received a donation of 2,500 pounds of flour from a local mill.

BORG: So we decided to gift to everybody who walks through our doors two loaves of bread.

CHANG: They've given out more than 14,000 loaves of bread in the past couple of weeks. The point is to give back, Borg says, give a little lift to someone who needs it. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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SOMOS CONNECTICUT is an initiative from Connecticut Public, the state’s local NPR and PBS station, to elevate Latino stories and expand programming that uplifts and informs our Latino communities. Visit CTPublic.org/latino for more stories and resources. For updates, sign up for the SOMOS CONNECTICUT newsletter at ctpublic.org/newsletters.

SOMOS CONNECTICUT es una iniciativa de Connecticut Public, la emisora local de NPR y PBS del estado, que busca elevar nuestras historias latinas y expandir programación que alza y informa nuestras comunidades latinas locales. Visita CTPublic.org/latino para más reportajes y recursos. Para noticias, suscríbase a nuestro boletín informativo en ctpublic.org/newsletters.

The independent journalism and non-commercial programming you rely on every day is in danger.

If you’re reading this, you believe in trusted journalism and in learning without paywalls. You value access to educational content kids love and enriching cultural programming.

Now all of that is at risk.

Federal funding for public media is under threat and if it goes, the impact to our communities will be devastating.

Together, we can defend it. It’s time to protect what matters.

Your voice has protected public media before. Now, it’s needed again. Learn how you can protect the news and programming you depend on.