42 - Chapter 38

Sa Bina spent her arts class learning about the instruments and musical styles in this world. Generally nobles were considered a patron of the arts, but it was considered uncouth for most to partake themselves. The only exception was to paint or to privately practice a few of the ‘more refined’ instruments. Generally speaking art was something that other people did for the entertainment of the nobles. If others enjoyed it, it was only by the grace and permission of the nobles.

Of course, the professor had not come right out and said this. Sa Bina had pieced the meaning from the way things were said, the reaction of the other students and her own past experiences. Of course, Sa Bina could have completely misunderstood the situation, yet she did not think that she had.

After her suggestions to the professor at the start of class, she had been sent to her seat to listen to the lecture, then spend some time attempting to draw. This was one of Sa Bina’s weakest skills. She could create technical drawings using instruments, but asked to create art free hand and her skills were all but non-existent. Her attempts had come across as rather poor examples of the skill, and had garnered a lot of derision from those that had seen them.

She would struggle to get through this class, though did she really have to suffer through it? She would need to find out what happened in the case she flunked a class completely, or if there was an alternative way to pass this class. She knew her own strengths, and more importantly her own interests. Put her in a play, ask her to act, she would have fun and do her best. Ask her to get involved in building a business or political intrigue, and she was the same. Ask her to stand in place and paint something like a watercolour and not only did her dexterity completely fail her, but she did not even want to put in any effort. Still one class that she did not find appealing out of eight was not a bad ratio.

Glad for the first time that her class had ended, Sa Bina left to meet her entourage. She wanted to get the books she needed, then return home so she could try to make her first attempt at sourdough bread. She missed the taste of good bread, and hoped she would be able to make something comparable.

She met with Lou Sie and her guards and they headed off towards the shopping district. They soon found themselves outside a modest book shop. The look was so reminiscent of the antique book stores in London that she had frequented in her last life, that she was briefly overcome by nostalgia.

She entered with Lou Sie and was immediately greeted by a male attendant. “Greetings, how may we help?” he asked.

“I am attending the academy,” said Sa Bina. “And I need a selection of books across my subjects.”

“Very good, my lady,” said the attendant. “Do you have a list? If not, we can put together a selection based on a list of your classes.”

“I do have a list,” said Sa Bina, handing over a consolidated list that she had put together during her last class. “I would also like a few recommendations on books covering culture, politics and general knowledge.”

The attendant took the list and looked through it. “I am sure we can get these books ready for you,” he replied. “Would you like them delivered? Also do you want them as we have access to them, or would you rather receive them all together.”

“Please send them as they become available,” replied Sa Bina. “My secretary Lou Sie will deal with the details.” With that exchange Sa Bina went off to peruse the shelves to see if anything caught her eye.

“You can send them to the old diplomatic estate,” said Lou Sie to the attendant. He was obviously surprised by that, but did not comment. “You can also send the bill there.”

“Very good miss,” he replied. “Will there be anything else?”

“Only if my lady finds something to her liking.” said Lou Sie.

The attendant went off to process the order and Lou Sie watched her mistress look through the shelves.

Sa Bina did not spend long on her brief search. She had things to do, and just wanted to see if she spotted anything that took her interest. They all seemed to be dry academic tomes, at least the section that she had looked at, so elected to leave it for now.

They left the shop and headed back to the estate. Sa Bina thought through the steps she would go through in her attempts to produce good bread. She would need to test the quality in terms of milling and purity. Then try to knead them all and see what results she got. Also baking in a wood fired oven with no temperature control would be an interesting experience. She had not had to do that since she had been a little girl in her first life, and she was not sure how much she remembered of that process.

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They returned to the estate and Sa Bina asked Lou Sie to inform the cook that she would be down to try her experiments shortly. She did not want to just shock the kitchen staff by randomly showing up. She went up to her room to take a quick bath and change into clean clothes. She really missed the ability to return home from a trip outside and just be able to take it easy. She hated that even short trips left her feeling gritty and in need of a full wash. The roads were well made in the city, but they still kicked up a lot of dust. That along with the smell of the horses left a lingering smell that was off putting. It would be much worse when it rained due to the smell of damp fur, so at least it was not as bad as it could be.

With Dian Fu’s help she undressed, and then took a quick bath. Once she felt scrubbed clean, she dressed in the simplest clothes that she had. Flour was going to get everywhere and there was no point in spoiling her nice dresses. She sent Dian Fu with a warning that she was on her way down, and then after a few minutes followed Dian Fu down to the main kitchens.

The main kitchens were a large cavernous affair in the sub basement of the building. The back half jutted out behind the main house with the chimney venting out into the air. The kitchen had attached pantries, a large work table in the centre, and a massive wood fired hearth on the back end. Above the hearth was a large clay oven which was accessed from the front. The opening allowed for flat breads to be baked on the hot stone, as well as meat and vegetables. They had large wooden paddles that were used to move the burning wood, as well as to place and remove food from the clay oven.

The head cook was obviously expecting her, and had a few of the kitchen helpers ready on the side. The work table had a selection of flour, as well as a jug of water, oil and the jug containing her growing yeast. It was good to have competent helpers.

“Thank you for having everything ready for our attempt,” said Sa Bina. “Would you like to talk me through the various types of flour?”

The cook proceeded to explain the name and type of each flour. They seemed to have no equivalent on earth as the names were not translated for her. That would make this more of a challenge as she would need to experiment with the various breads.

Sa Bina decided to make small rolls from all the different types of flour to see how they all reacted. First she started with checking how finely the flour had been milled and how well it had been sifted. She asked questions as she went through them one by one. The staff had obviously taken care to follow her instructions as the flour was milled much finer than normal. Yet it could still be better. The sifting was well done, with very few parts of husks remaining. Until her smiths came up with a better sieve, she would need to live with some issues.

“This is a good start,” said Sa Bina, after she had checked all the types of flour. “We can make a first attempt with this, but we will need the flour to be milled even finer than this for the future. We would ideally go through several rounds of sifting and milling to get only the grain and discard all the husk. We are going to attempt the process with all the types of flour to see how things turn out. You should follow along.”

The first thing Sa Bina did was to test the yeast starter to ensure it was ready. She also made sure it was enough. Sa Bina had made a mistake when she had started the process and had the yeast starter prepared from only one type of flour. That would mean her first attempt would be a mixed grain. That would skew her results.

“For next time, can we please create the starter yeast with all the different types of flour so we can see what works best. In fact, we can start that process after we complete the first step. The first thing we are going to do is mix 2 cups of water with 4 cups of flour. Then we are going to let it rest.”

Sa Bina did not have access to a good scale, and she would need to convert grams to the local measurements in any case, so she decided to go by ratios. It should work for the first attempt. She would need to refine the measurements to improve accuracy in the future. It was surprising how each step revealed even more things that she would need to address. Steps built upon steps.

Everyone worked together to complete the first step and leave it to rest for half a bell or so. In that time they worked on creating live yeast for all the different types of flour. By the end they had an even dozen samples on the go. That was good as it would let them carry on working on the samples in batches. Thankfully the cook had gone overboard and created a massive amount of starter yeast, so they should have enough to attempt all twelve types of bread.

After the batches had all rested, they started the process of making the dough. They added around 4/5th of a cup of starter to each dough as well as a little salt, Sa Bina somewhat approximating roughly two teaspoons. Then the hard work began to thoroughly mix the dough. Having to do it by hand, and for 12 sets was hard work. As each was completed Sa Bina checked that the dough was workable and slightly sticky.

Then the real work began, to fold and stretch the dough by hand to develop the gluten. At least Sa Bina hoped there was gluten in the flour to develop, otherwise her attempts would be a complete failure. As each dough felt like it had been worked enough, she left it to proof, moving on to another one, only returning to the first after they had worked their way through all dozen sets of dough. Finally they were done, and the dough was left to rise. Sa Bina left instructions to call her back down when the dough had roughly doubled in size.

Sa Bina decided to go and see how her team had progressed during the day while she waited for the first proof to complete. It was going to be a long night. She did not yet have access to a fridge to cold proof overnight, and so she would need to stay up and check the dough as it became ready. The last thing she wanted was to over-proof on her first attempt.