About a year ago, I requested a free sample of Carl Griffith's 1847 sourdough starter, which was promptly sent to me in dried form. It sat around for a year until I finally cranked the starter into action. It's sitting in its container in my fridge now, waiting for me to make some sourdough bread. Or muffins. Or pancakes. Or waffles. Or...
I find it fascinating that it's believed this sourdough starter can trace its origins back to the Gold Rush. How few parts of our life can reach this far back into our past.
About Me
- Gael Fashingbauer Cooper
- I'm an entertainment editor at MSNBC.com, and have maintained Pop Culture Junk Mail since August, 1999. The New York Times called the site "one of the best places to explore pop culture online," and Entertainment Weekly included it on their Top 100 Web Sites list. If you like weird food, strange products, and 1970s and 1980s nostalgia, PCJM is your home away from home.
I have a brand new BOOK, written with Brian Bellmont. "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s." Buy it online, and follow our retro reminiscing on our GenXtinct blog, Facebook, and Twitter.
4 comments:
Plenty! Don't you watch James Burke's "Connections"?
Heh, no, but I did take a college course based on his "The Day The Universe Changed." (Sadly, the class was awful.)
my family had a sourdough starter that, if my crazy granmother is to be believed, dates back about that far, until one day, she forgot to pull another starter from the dough. Or something... she babbled on for years about it, so it must have been traumatic. That said, I seem to recall some sourdough biscuts when I was a kid. Those biscuits are probably singularly responsible for making me a carboholic today. I'm always eating bread, hoping to reclaim that first high...
Um, not to be an ass, but can't most everything's origins be traced back to way before the Gold Rush? You're not a creationist, are you? OK, yeah, I'm an ass. I'm just jealous cause I want some sourdough.
Post a Comment