Chookles, duckles & Thermomix bread

A couple of days ago, a mother duck turned up with 7 ducklings.

I’ve been feeding the wild ducks ever since we moved here, with rolled oats in a dish of water (they gobble it down, the oats get filtered out and down and the excess water gets siphoned out the sides of the beak—effective, but messy). They make the trek from the pool at the front of the property opposite to the pools at the rear of our property, checking out the feed dish on the way.

Mother D came this morning, I fed her and all of them went down to the pools. Later I came back to the house and they’d returned. She had her head stuck through the wire of the Girl’s playground snaffling up some seeds. The little duckles milled around her feet.

The chooks were fascinated by these tiny, furry, peeping balls. I wish I could have managed a photo to show the expressions on their faces, but there was no time to get the camera. As soon as Mother D saw me she rushed over to beg for more oats. I put them in the dish and bolted indoors for the camera:

I wonder if the sight of the ducklings stirred some deep-hidden motherly feelings in the Girl’s genes. I’d love to have enough room to build a huge chook run (well away from gum trees that fall over and drop branches), and get a rooster for the Girls. I’d like to see them with their own flock of fluffy chickles to fuss over.

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I really like the way the Thermomix handles bread baking.

I’ve made my own bread for many years now, briefly tried a bread machine and then, preferring the flavour of my own bread, went back to hand kneading.

The major benefit of the Thermomix is that it will grind grain, so the flour is as fresh as it can be. It takes longer to get the ingredients together than it does to get to a lump of finished dough.

1 minute to grind the grain
5 seconds to mix the ingredients
1 minute 30 seconds to knead the dough

The dough is tight and elastic, just the way it would be after hand kneading for 15 minutes or more, and not sticky. I roll it into a thick sausage and put it in a tin, or free-form it (or divide it into rolls), then let it double in size.

And here’s the good bit. It goes into a cold oven. Saving power. As the oven heats, the dough rises just that little bit more, then the increasing heat kills the yeast and rising stops: