word of the day (or week) or whenever I get another word up here

The word is "brainish". It doesn't mean what your brain might first think it means. "Brainish" doesn't mean "smart" or "nerdy" or even "the way an animal hide might smell after it's been brain-tanned" (one of nature's many wonders is that every mammal has just sufficient brains to tan its own hide). Nope. None of those.

I found this word while Matt and I were wondering with our own weak and unsophiscated brains what "braising" is. I thought it had something to do with roasting but then started to doubt myself because the context was the back of a seed packet that recommended braising the largest leaves of the strain of mustard contained within. Braized mustard? We looked it up. "Braise" means "to cook slowly in fat and little moisture in a closed pot." Sounds rather like what happens in a dutch oven. On the opposite page and nowhere near "braise" was the word "brainish". One had to be grazing in the dictionary to find it. If you are starting to wonder why it is taking me so long to tell you want "brainish" means, that may be because I am trying to get a brainish reaction out of you, gentle reader. The color of this post is a clue, though.

Oh, all right.

"Brainish" means: impetuous, hotheaded. It's from circa 1530 and it's marked as archaic. Don't delay! We must rush to save this word from extinction! Use it today. Hell, be it today. Then use it. Then post a comment to tell the rest of us what you did that was brainish - and whether you need us to post bail for you.

bread-baking update

Here is an update from someone who is much more like an expert on making bread with no kneading. People have occasionally been puzzled by the lack of kneading in my bread recipe. This recipe goes way more than one better. The big catch: it only makes one loaf at a time. I make four. Once or twice a week. I haven't tried this recipe out to see how it works with a lot more whole wheat flour in it. Or how it works in Stella, our wood-fired cookstove. (Sorry no pictures of Stella are as yet available.) If this is something I would need to make every day, then I would want to make it in Stella - and it better be really easy. The dutch-oven would probably be very compatible with Stella's temperament; she rather likes to burn the back ends of the left rear loaves unless you rotate the batch every ten or fifteen minutes - and, yes, that's as tedious as it sounds. With Stella's eight- to nine-month season of use starting to wind down for the year, I think I will try this recipe as an occasional lark but I expect to stick with my own nearly-no-knead bread at least until next fall.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=102124561

I don't know why I can't get this link to work. It drops off the first "story" after "templates" in translation. Once you get the npr site just type in "kneadless bread" in the search window and you'll get there after all.