I
found myself in charge of designing a program for thirty 6 to 12 year olds for
the annual Latvian 3x3 camp in Gaŗezers, Michigan, and although coming up with ideas was
easy enough, implementation was a different matter. Our assigned space was one
of the new Avoti classrooms (used by
the 6-week summer high school program), but as a couple dozen kids buzzing around me in an enclosed room lacked
appeal, we spent the majority of our time outdoors. In addition to hikes and
nature walks, one of the most successful activities was a morning in the
kitchen… outdoors!
The Saulgrieži (indoor) kitchen was being
used by the Latvian cooking class for adults in the mornings, and although we
could have tried to squeeze in 10-15 kids one afternoon, the space is just too
tiny. My mother was the first to suggest cooking outdoors, and once I had
convinced her to be the guest teacher, a plan quickly fell into place; we would
make bread.
Although
the bread recipe featured in this post isn’t Latvian, per se, bread has always been honored and appreciated within the
Latvian culture. Traditional rye and barley breads nourish not just the body
but also the soul, and hold a special place in the lives of many latvieši both in Latvia and abroad.
The
day before our campfire bread baking activity, we gathered wood for the fire
and found small saplings to cut down and strip of bark for cooking
sticks. The afternoon in the woods featured many lessons: how to identify
poison ivy, how to find dry wood, teamwork, and which species of tree to
harvest (and which to leave). By the end of the day we had a stack of firewood
ready, and the next morning all that was left was to build a fire and start
cooking.
There
is an art to building a fire, and although I’ve found that offering the
students some suggestions will help speed things along, I prefer to let them
learn from experience. The kids worked together to stack their ugunskurs, and with a little help we
soon had a hot fire burning. I threw on some bigger logs, and then we stepped
over to a picnic table to make the dough – the fire would have to burn down to
coals so that we could cook on it.
My
mother had found a recipe that could easily be made in Ziploc bags. Similar to
the bannock that originated in Scotland and Ireland centuries ago, it is an
unleavened bread and features only a few simple ingredients. To exclude the
possibility of illness from bread that hasn’t cooked thoroughly we skipped the
eggs, and by sticking measuring spoons and cups in with each ingredient, we nearly
eliminated measuring error from the equation. Here’s the recipe we used…
Stick
twist bread (cooked on a campfire)
Ingredients:
1
tablespoon sugar
2/3
cups flour
1
teaspoon baking powder
Salt to
taste (less than 1 teaspoon)
¼ cup
milk
1 ½ tablespoons
canola oil
Directions:
1. Mix
together dry ingredients in Ziploc, then add milk and oil. We helped measure
out the liquids so that it wouldn’t get messy.
2.
Press out all the air from the bag and seal, then knead until all ingredients
have been combined.
3. On
a flat surface dusted with flour (or simply in your hands), roll the dough out into a long ‘snake’.
Flatten, then wind around your cooking stick.
4.
Cook over the coals of the fire until done, then serve!
The
result can be called stick bread or twists, as the dough is wrapped around a
clean stick; we stripped green saplings of bark and whittled them down for our
cookers. The key is in getting the dough to the right consistency: not too dry (it will fall off
the cooking stick as it warms and dries out) and not too wet (too sticky to
work with). But kādreiz tā gadās, and when losing the dough to the fire seemed imminent, we would place
the half-cooked bread on some aluminum foil to allow it additional baking time
over the coals.
Placing
some larger logs around the coals eased the baking process, as the children
could rest their cooking sticks on the logs while still keeping them close to
the heat. By rotating the stick often and toasting the bread over hot coals
instead of open flame, the bread cooks evenly. It’s done when it has a deep
golden-brown exterior and sounds hollow when tapped – around 5-10 minutes,
depending on the fire and thickness of dough. Last of all, a drizzle of honey over
the finished product really sweetened the deal (although I found the bread
tasty without). I imagine cinnamon, Nutella and jam could also serve as
toppings in a pinch...
