The fact is that I’ve only baked one loaf of bread on my own. I’ve been the observer, the helper, the sometimes-bowl-washer, the happy-to-gobble-it-up, yes-please, to Nick’s countless hearth loaves and artisan breads that have come out of our kitchen. I am the majority pie-baker in our household, but I thought it was time to finally branch out into some bread-baking myself, and to start with the basics.

Josey Baker is a ridiculously charismatic baker who lives locally and operates The Mill across the bay in San Francisco. He doesn’t come from a formal culinary background; he fell in love with bread and dove whole-heartedly into production, selling his loaves out of his home, pedaling them around town, and carving out a space at Mission Pie before starting his own bakery. His book is filled with advice perfect for the beginning baker, and the progression of recipes makes it easy to start slowly diving into the nuances and details of baking bread at home. He has provided the inspiration for many, many batches of chocolate chip cookies and delicious bread in our home. Thanks, Josey.

This loaf is his first recipe in the book: a basic country loaf or a sandwich loaf, baked in a loaf pan. There’s only a little mixing and absolutely no kneading involved, and most of the work is patiently waiting for the dough to rise.

And what better to go with a loaf of freshly baked bread? You bet, homemade preserves. We’ve had a lot of strawberries hanging around — I anxiously bought a huge batch in anticipation of fourth of July baking, and realized half-way through last week that they wouldn’t in fact last until the weekend.

Syrupy fruit simmering — about to become jam!

I was turned on to canning and preserving at home when my friend Erin started making her own preserves. She brought me the best batch of strawberry jam that I had ever tasted, because the flavor of the fruit wasn’t masked by too much sugar — it was inherently strawberry, and super fresh, and I consumed that jam at a record speed.

And last year Nick and I took two canning classes hosted by 18 Reasons in San Francisco. We learned how to get started — the basics of sanitizing jars, prepping fruit and bringing it to a rolling boil, and filling and sealing jars — and left with batches of delicious syrup, shrub, and jam and preserves. From apricot jam, to a ginger-meyer-lemon marmalade, to cherry preserves, it was an inspiring way to get started with our own canning habit.

For this round, we hulled strawberries, crushed pink peppercorn and lavender, and made a small batch of strawberry-lavender jam with a hint of pink peppercorn. It smelled luscious simmering on the stove and perfumed the entire house. We used a two-to-one ratio of fruit-to-sugar, and I wouldn’t want it any sweeter.