Back to the Roots

As a society, we're severely un-involved with the production of food. Many of us- like me-- just much on whatever happens to just "show up" in our fridge. The other day, I was eating one of those frozen chimichangas when I stumbled across the realization of two horrifying things: One, I had no idea who had purchased these burritos or where I'd even acquired one. I didn't realize I was eating??? Two, I would definitely not have the skills necessary to produce the ingredients to make such a burrito myself, if there came a crisis where knowledge of that kind would be necessary. I was completely, utterly inept.

It's definitely time for me to start considering what I'm putting into my body.

According to the US Department of Agriculture, 155 people are fed annually per 1 farmer. That's a bit of a weightily imbalanced ratio. The majority of those people will not have the skill set to produce their own food. On top of this, the average age of the American farmer is rising. Cited from the United States Census of Agriculture-- back in 1945, it was 39. In 2007, it was 58. Unemployment in rural America is rising, as is the net agricultural import of our country (balanced against export). So, what are we to do with this information? What does it mean?

Well, for me, it meant to have a teensy anxiety attack. And by teensy, I mean-- "HOW AM I GOING TO SURVIVE ONCE THE APOCALYPSE REACHES ME. I CANT EVEN RUN FAST ENOUGH FROM THE ZOMBIES AND NOW I'M AGRICULTURALLY WORTHLESS" Maybe it's a bit much to equate not having a garden to becoming a zombie, but if that's what I need to threaten y'all with, I'm not above it.

There we go.

Anyways; America got its start as an agricultural wonderland, and since then, in many decades gone by, that expanse of free land and hard-earned virtue of work ethic has faded from existence, as well of our knowledge of where food comes from. This all began when our ancestors made the merciless, greed-motivated decision to massacre Native Americans by the thousands. Actually, that's not necessarily true-- Even before that, Columbus practiced mass extermination of the Taino; killing over five million withing the course of three years. After Columbus, the "Indian Removal" policy was set into place to clear the land (via genocide) for the white settlers. You've doubtless heard of the Trail of Tears; the brutally forced, evocative march of the Cherokee Indians resulting in the decimation of their population. If you haven't heard of this, you've probably been raised on the US school system; which omits all our horrifying wrongdoings so that no one has to feel guilty about the death tolls resulting from white supremacy! But, as much as I love debating against Donald Trump's supporters, that's not the point of this article. Maybe another time (Oh, there will be another time. Trust me.)

Let's see if I can get through this without getting sidetracked. Basically, I set myself our on a mission to make tapenade bruschetta from scratch and trace all of its ingredients back to their sources. It gets a bit complicated, given the sheer number of components in the recipe. Speaking of, it'll be at the end of this article, so stay tuned or just skim it ;)

The ingredients of my bruschetta are pretty straightforward-- tapenade bread, mozzarella, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, cherry tomatoes and basil. Where it gets to be more difficult process is the bread itself; being homemade, from scratch, I needed to research every ingredient within the bread. That leaves me with this protracted list: pitted black olives, mushrooms, sardine fillets, garlic cloves, dried thyme, dried marjoram, olive oil, granulated yeast, Kosher sea salt, bread flour, mozzarella cheese, fresh basil leaves, cherry tomatoes, balsamic vinegar. First things first, let's start with the ingredients of the tapenade.
Pitted black olives. In retrospect, it was very much my fault for getting these canned and not locally. I can't even express how hard it is to track down the origins of an exact can of olives. Not only that, but to have to call a busy company for no other reason than to ask what farm their olives are grown on. Plus, I sound like the world's biggest idiot when there's a big, all caps, "CALIFORNIA" stamped onto the label. However, I did find it, and now it's on my little map of origin that you can find below.
Chopped mushrooms. Also, from the can. It turns out that I was remarkably lacking in foresight. Anyways, same company. They're going to block my contact. It turns out, these little slicey 'shrooms hail from China, in the Fujian providence. This bread is constituted from an around the world adventure! (At least for a few cans of ingredients. It has been a noble journey).
Sardine fillets. Part of me didn't want to know at all where from and how these little fishies got to me. That in itself shows a tad bit of American complacency, doesn't it? Anyways, I tracked them down a bit, and they're from Thailand. Instead of coming directly from "Chicken of the Sea", the brand based in San Diego as is on the label, they source from a company called the Thai Union Group that produces and sells to brand names various seafood based food products. They're the largest producer of shelf-stable tuna in the world. The fishing grounds for my particular sardines were located in the Andaman Sea southwest of continental Thailand. And now, it's got a little marker on my map!
Garlic cloves. Thankfully, these were purchased from a local produce stand in our town, whose owner my dad happens to know. With a little phone call to him, I could easily trace back these white garlic cloves to their farm of origin. Turns out, they're from Christopher Ranch in Gilroy, California.
Dried thyme. Our garden. Thank goodness.
Dried marjoram. This comes from our garden as well. So relieving, honestly. I didn't think I could ever be so overjoyed at not buying something from the store.

Olive oil. After a little digging (aka just reading the super helpful label) I found that this was packed in Spain. Unfortunately, however, it's a mix of oils from Italy, Greece, Spain and Tunisia. My marker is on the packing city of Lorca, Spain.
Granulated yeast. The way that yeast is manufactured is really quite fascinating. I may have to do one of my science-y posts on it. They have to culture little yeast cells in a lab completely away from outside influence, sterilized, in little flasks. Everything is measured, from the acidity to the levels of ammonium salts added to the exposure of air. It's all very precise. Also, there's molasses in your bread! The yeast is fed by sugar, and that's the preferred medium. I'm going to have to run a ton of experiments on this. I didn't end up hearing back as to where the yeast in my package came from, but suffice it to know how it was produced ^.^
Kosher sea salt. The salt I used was harvested off of the northern coast of Brazil. This map is starting to look like a lovely bucket list-- hey, I could travel to all these places! Produce my own materials to make bread! :3
Bread flour. For this company, wheat is purchased from smaller farms around the state of Kansas. My bag of flour was milled in Kansas City. Boop! There it is on the map now.

Mozzarella cheese. This is getting easier and easier as I go alo-- oops. Spoke too soon. It's bizarre to me, how one company produces and sells to another, who then gets to slap their label onto something they weren't even involved in the making off. The brand presents itself as certified Italian but actually sources from Wisconsin xD Oh, well. That just shows what big corporation does to the integrity of trade.
Fresh basil leaves. I purchased a starter plant from a little farm along the Snoqualmie river. Since I love caprese and make it often, I definitely need a little basil plant of my own for fresh pickings whenever. Now, I'm downright awful with plants, but this one is my darling (NOTE: I need help deciding upon names. So I can become emotionally attached before it dies, of course.)

Cherry tomatoes. These little beauties also came from our garden. Whew, that's a lot less research for me! A lot healthier, too ;)
Balsamic vinegar. Finally. At the end of the list. We bought this vinegar at Trader Joe's, and it comes directly from Modena, Italy. It's so lovely that they have that right on the label *sigh of relief*

It's incredible how much we rely on transportation to get our food to us. Imagine the chaos if the security of our reliance shattered with a fuel crisis! Some of the ingredients for my recipe came from over three thousand miles away. As an American, citizen of a first world country, I don't bat an eye at insanely processed and preserved foods (they have to be, in order to survive that kind of a voyage). A few years back, I took a trip to explore the inner-workings of an apple orchard plant. Apple transportation is especially interesting because these fruits emit large quantities of an organic chemical, a gas, called ethylene. This chemical causes other surrounding fruits (including the apples themselves) to ripen incredibly quickly. Of course, this presents a problem in transporting fruits hundreds of miles. The chemical is released in plant tissue in more volume as a response to the stress of heat and pressure-- handlers must take care to cool the apples to a certain temperature, and then not to jostle them. They are stored in large cooling rooms at temperatures just above freezing-- I know this from personal experience, having accidentally been locked in one on said apple plant trip. But that's another story. Carbon dioxide and oxygen levels in the air are carefully monitored, even during the shipping process. In addition, most apples are picked still partly green so that they may continue to ripen while they are transported. This damages the flavor of the apples, but it works to keep them fresh (not "overripe", or ethylene rotted) for sale in other areas.
We go to great lengths to preserve and transport our foods not only from state to state but country to country. I, for one, didn't know before today how yeast was produced! I'll have to create a whole segment in my blog dedicated to the science of food and its handling, at this rate :P But I'm sure you're getting anxious as to the real meat of this post, the dish I created from scratch-- Caprese Bruschetta. Without further ado:

Tapenade Bread

For the tapenade sauce:
6 oz pitted black olives

4 oz sliced mushrooms

2 tsp capers, drained (optional)

2 sardine fillets

2 cloves of garlic

1/4 tsp dried thyme

1/4 tsp dried marjoram

2 tbs olive oil

For the dough:

1 1/2 cups lukewarm water

3/4 tbs granulated yeast

1/2 tbs Kosher salt

3 1/5 cups bread flour

White cornmeal (optional)

Tapenade sauce, see above

1. Mix the yeast and salt with the water in a large bowl. Then, mix in the other ingredients for the dough (excepting the tapenade sauce) without kneading, using a spoon. Incorporate the last bit of flour with wet hands.
2. Coarsely chop and add in the ingredients from the tapenade sauce and fold in with your hands or with the spoon. 
3. Cover (not airtight) and allow to rest at room temperature until the dough rises and collapses, flattening on top. This should take approximately two hours. It can be used immediately afterwards, or stored for up to seven days. 
4. On baking day, cut off a pound (half) piece of the dough and sprinkle with flour. Roll into a ball by stretching the surface around to the bottom on all four sides. Allow to rest and rise on a cornmeal or flour covered pizza peel for thirty minutes.
5. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees (Fahrenheit), with a baking stone on the middle rack and boiler tray on another shelf that won't interfere with the baking bread. Sprinkle the loaf liberally with flour and slash an X on the top. Leave the flour in place for baking.
6. Slide the loaf onto the hot stone. Pour 1/2 cup of tap water into the boiler tray and quickly shut the oven door. Bake 35 to 40 minutes, or until browned and firm.
7. Allow to cool and tap off some of the flour before slicing or eating

Great! Now, let's get started on the caprese bruschetta (this is the easier part, don't worry)

Caprese Bruschetta

1 loaf of tapenade bread

4 oz balsamic vinegar

8 oz fresh mozzarella 

Several leaves of freshly chopped basil

1 1/2 cups cherry tomatoes

1. Pour the balsamic vinegar into a small saucepan, and heat over low to medium heat until it comes to a slow boil. Allow to simmer for about 8-10 minutes. The vinegar will thicken while it cooks. Once the amount that is in the pan reduces by about half, turn the heat off. Pour the vinegar into a bowl to allow to cool. As the vinegar cools it will thicken more and become a glaze.
2. Chop the mozzarella, tomatoes, and basil into small, bite-sized pieces. Slice the loaf into long, slender pieces with average thickness. 
3. OPTIONAL: Heat the over to 400 degrees (F) and cover a cookie sheet with tin foil. Lay the slices on the foil and butter, then sprinkle with olive oil. Bake for 8 minutes or until crispy and golden.
4. Serve the slices of bread with the mozzarella, tomatoes and basil piled on top and sprinkled with the balsamic glaze.
5. Enjoy!