F 1 D 0 -- 02 06 29 at 11 15 Guar Gum and Xanthan Gum. I picked up some of each of these just before my trip. They were on sale at the Bulk Barn nearby, and something inside me said, "I've just GOT to get me some of these!" So I did. They're both plain white powders. They're both in the foods granny used to make, if your grand mother was Betty Crocker. Or if she was related to an old military guy, General Foods. Guar Gum is a very good emulsifier, and has a zillion good qualities. It was discovered when Locust Bean Gum became hard to get, in the 1950s. Guar is a nutritious bean which grows in arid places, like the hot parts of India. Guar is best in bread. Add a small teaspoon to 2 cups of flour. It absorbs 9 times its volume in fluid. It adds yield to dough, so it works with extra liquid. I thought Xanthan Gum was the same, but when I used that, the bread didn't rise, but it was still a good loaf. My recipe for bread recently is 2c flour 1c wetstuff 1c drystuff 2ts yeast 1ts gum 1ts salt Wetstuff 1 egg 1 oz corn syrup (one of the ts of yeast, above) 3 ts butter milk as needed warm it with your hands, trying to feed the yeast. But the eggs are too cold, so just mix it in when the time comes. Drystuff flax seeds oat bran roasted sunflower seeds Procedure. To the baking container on bread machine... add 1 ts yeast add 2 c flour add salt Press Start (raisin bread). It mixes the flour. Add the cup of Drystuff. It mixes that too, kind of. Help it do it right, with a wooden spoon handle. Add the Wetstuff. Is it making a dry mixture? Add something wet. Sometimes I use extra milk, other times extra oil or butter. This time? I made the mixture *very* wet. I must have added just less than an extra cup of milk. But the Guar Gum just dealt with it, and after some kneading cycle, I found this beautiful shaped dough ball. After 2h in the machine, I had a peek. I should not have as it feel after that. But it rose nicely. When I did the same bread with Xanthan Gum, it didn't rise much at all. Xanthan Gum seems to be a mixing agent. It is used in domestic mixes so that the stuff combines easily. It doesn't assist the baking, except to bind oil with water. It is synergistic with Guar Gum, says the literature. So if you use both, you get extra benefits. Guar Gum has weight and cholesterol reducing properties. It worked, and seemed to be an anti cancer agent as well. The FDA took it off the market because it also has gum qualities: a number of people have choked on it, and a few died. Mixing it properly should not be left to chance. This stuff binds to liquid, and if you don't give it enough, it will bind into a tuff goo in your throat. So never ever just taste some dry off the spoon. I was surprised when I read the abstracts about the mice: the researchers were expecting that this evil additive caused cancer, and then after the test, they found the test group had less than the control group. No surprise for me though. This stuff is gummy, but is also from a nutritious bean thing, and so it has properties of fibre, and it is hydro phyllic. Just like Metamucil or Psyllium. Cooking is in my future. There is an eggplant, about 10 tomatoes, about 10 lbs of mushrooms, and a handful of potatoes looking to me for advice. Also some marinated blade roast. I'm melting. My home workout is very improved. I'm up to 30 minutes without a rest on the eliptical walking machine. Then I do light (8 lb) weights for arms shoulders and more. I should be doing sit ups and pushups, but I'm here writing to you. It is 4pm. I was thinking that your email was broken, since I was getting messages suggesting your time is three hours earlier than mine. Then I wondered whether the problem was on Bryan's end. Well, he wrote me back and suggested that my own time zone was wrong. I called up the control panel, and sure enough, my time zone was set for the Pacific Region. Eudora has this thing it does: it alters the message I receive so it shows up in my own local time. So I receive a note for 8am, but you sent it at 11am. I guess if I did lots of email with people in other continents it would make sense for the mail client to sort this all out for me. I'm having a shower. I've been to bed and woken up, and made for breakfast eggs, sweet pepper sauce, and fried potatoes. For some reason, I didn't actually get to have them myself. But I'll have some soon. I've since gone shopping, and picked up a pork leg roast at 85c lb. I am still wondering whether I should buy a smaller roast, without the hock, at 99c lb, or the big one, with more skin on it, for 85. This one cost 6.90 altogether. They had none last night, and I thought it was all finished. I cut the roast into three parts, and will freeze the two boneless sections. I've pressure cooked the bony one, and will see how it comes out. When I should have also been doing late afternoon exercises, I took to making another experimental bread. I did the xanthan gum thing, and found the bread didn't rise but had wonderful taste and texture. I did the guar gum, and it too had appeal, and also rose a lot! Today I used a teaspoon of each of them. Wow, does that make the mixture stiff! I had to keep adding liquid. I think it was finally the right consistency after 2.5 c of wetstuff. That is compared to only 1c that I use normally. I hope it rises, but not to overflowing the container. Ok, I'm going to exercise and then have another shower, and then see what else I can get into here. That's all I know.