Kneading Conference West 2011
Hello,
I just attended Kneading Conference West 2011 [1] in Mount Vernon, Washington, which was held September 15-17.
What a wonderful gathering of farmers, millers, researchers and bakers! I met a lot of very nice and interesting people!
The whole experience was fantastic - meeting so many people and seeing a few people I'd met before, attending the seminars and lectures, the beautiful setting in amongst the gardens and orchard, and the food was delicious!
I had the pleasure of meeting Farine-mc at the conference, along with another Vancouver Island food writer, Rhona McAdam.
They have both posted really nice write-ups about the conference:
http://www.farine-mc.com/2011/09/back-from-kneading-conference-west-2011.html [2]
http://reallygoodwriter.com/kneading-conference-west/kneading-conference-west-day-1/ [3]
http://reallygoodwriter.com/cheese/kneading-conference-west-day-2/ [4]
*Edited to add:
http://reallygoodwriter.com/uncategorized/kneading-conference-west-over-and-out/ [5]
*Edited to add:
I also really enjoyed meeting Teresa of Northwest Sourdough. Teresa has also written about Kneading Conference West, and included some great photos and video! in her post:
http://www.northwestsourdough.com/discover/?p=2444 [6]
These ladies have written about the conference far better than I ever possibly could, so I will stop writing now and just share pictures of ovens, and breads and pastries brought and made by the instructors and attendees! :^)
Wood-firing bagels (note the charred bagel board!)
...bagels were flipped once dry enough
Beautiful breakfasts! kindly provided by BreadFarm [7] and Macrina Bakery and Cafe [8]
BreadFarm's lemon-berry danish was exquisite! ... Macrina's pumpkin bread was fabulous!
...and Macrina's beautiful bundt cake:
Some baking from the conference classes
Professional Baking class taught by Jesse Dodson and Michael Eggebrecht
Professional Baking class - Boule - wow!
Large Ciabatta - Professional Baking class
fresh, moist, delicious...the cheese was great too
Barley breads (instructors Andrew Ross, Leslie Mackie)
...and tasty barley pretzels also!
Morning Buns from Andrew Meltzer's Laminated dough class (beauties!)
...a lovely scoring pattern on this loaf, wood-fired and made with freshly milled flour and instruction from Larry Jansen
An assortment of extremely delicious breads brought by Cliff Leir, of fol epi bakery [9] in Victoria, BC
(slightly blurry shot, trying to get my camera to go quicker than that knife coming in on the left!)
...and a couple of ovens, the oven on the right constructed on site! (instructor Kiko Denzer)
A tour of the BreadFarm Bakery was offered, and what a display of gorgeous breads. I've tasted the Roasted Allium bread and Sour Cherry Lemon bread - incredibly flavorful :^) Here are just a few of their lovely breads!
I am so happy I got the chance to meet and talk to so many amazing people, to learn lots of new things, and taste so much good food and bread at this Kneading Conference!
:^) from breadsong