Meraki bread
A few years ago I was working with 5 kids and Rishi-Labs on a project of a veg art café in Caicun Village in Dali, Yunnan Province, China.
During our daily preparations, the guys said me that the sour dough yeast used for our bread and pizza was not working as I showed them before and they had no idea why.
“It doesn’t rise up. It looks dead”.
I answered them that was just about their intentions to do a good job, passionately.
They laugh at me, so I took the challenge: 6 bowls to mix the ingredients, one for each of us.
Same water, same flour, same yeast to regenerate.
They were wordless. Their 5 results were completely different from mine.
My yeast rised up quickly and theirs it didn’t at all.
There is a driving force more powerful than steam, electricity and atomic energy: the will. - Albert Einstein -
A few months later happened that when I back to the art café after a few weeks of absence…the yeast died. They told me about this sadly, aware that was dying our creature.
Actually it was very very sick but nod died yet.
I lit some incences, choose some good classical music, I washed accurately bowls and the working table moved to the centre of our yard. We sat around making good wishes, then I made the dough and I left under the hot sun, properly covered.
After 2 hours was totally rised up.
It’s all about love. Water and flour makes just water and flour.
Water, flour and love can make the magic happens.
Meraki means doing something with total love and pure soul. It is leaving a little piece of yourself in your creative work.
One year later, at Hungry Buddha in Shaxi, I baked a round shaped bread dough and when came out from the oven…
....was a Meraki bread!!!