A Knotted Mind

When did we start multitasking the way we do now?

I was driving to the gym the other day listening to my favorite track and suddenly a couple of things happened at once. My phone rang on the bluetooth, I answered it with a click of a button in the swank wheel I was behind (it was an automatic with a steering wheel gear paddle), so I always have my dratted left hand free to do nothing with). The music muted, the call was answered. In a matter of minutes I have spoken, searched a number and sent a contact to the person on the other line, discussed a meeting, received an email confirming the time and date with which a click of a button got added on to my calendar (which is synced to my laptop and my Ipad lying in two different locations). As though mechanically, the music was back to playing again and I had reached my destination.

That’s when it hit me – the last thing I remembered was, I was halfway to my destination when I answered the call, when I completed this little bit you read above I had reached my destination and I have absolutely no recollection of how fast I was going, what route I was taking (my usual, I know), who must I have passed, how many traffic lights (and did I break any?)… my thoughts continued to play out a scene but all I could think about was the talk I had with the person.

This is the most simple of examples I can think of in a typical daily routine of a person today (for lack of a better word shall I say ‘millennial’?). There is so much more out there which is automated and part of our lives that if I was to relate all of them here, I would probably have gone through several hundred thousand of words.

Have our minds / brains gotten rewired to adapt to these changes? Yes, most certainly.

Many times I notice when I am driving off to somewhere I have these momentarily lapses of memory when I know I’m driving towards a place but then suddenly I am on a wrong route going someplace familiar but realizing I should be heading the other way. Most of these times I have only me and the music on and no other task happening at the same time.

It’s funny how 18 years ago (probably when I was starting off my first job after graduating) I was never this ‘connected’. I wasn’t in a position up there enough to be needed on call every single moment, my email was available to me only on my desktop at work / home, no automatic cars, so manual drive vehicles kept my arms, legs and rest of the normal bodily functions extremely active and my only thought was the damn traffic which never let me get anywhere (by the way that has gotten even worse and yet we can multitask).

I agree, I am not one for driving and texting / calls / replying on any other method of communication together but somehow, somewhere this has taken over our lives and we refuse to tune off – knotting our brains even more so as the years go by and rewiring ourselves. To put it simply, with each passing year it’s like an iOS upgrade for our brains – and as we all know we cant replace our brains with a newer-better model it has to be rewired to be able to keep up with everything thereby slowing us down just like an older model of a device.

Having said this, it’s also reflecting on our physical presence when with family at dinner, or friends hanging out, or at work. We are constantly so immersed into our gadgets (which formulate our main line of communication) that all forms of communication are in the blue screens of our handhelds. Many a times I have had futile attempts of requesting the physical beings around me to keep away their handhelds when we are out hanging out or probably just trying to have a conversation. Sometime we have been successful – all the more when we are at home and our handhelds somehow go out of charge and we are happy connecting it to base which is away from us.

Well, guess what? Disconnecting is the new connecting.

I was at a friends place the other day and somehow for the first time, all except one, were away from their phones and it was like a new lease of life for our brains. Discussions from politics to current affairs cropped up, a blending of opinions – some heated, some subdued took place and there was a healthy camaraderie which was something I had experienced when I was in school and playing a game with friends out in the open.

My generation is at that stage when we can tune in and out of these technologically driven minds. Our generalization of situations are weirdly aligned to what we remember us to be distantly in the past and our future selves look like we got to keep pushing or we wont be able to keep up. On the other hand, todays generation is completely born rewired. I have seen less than 2 year olds swiping handhelds as their new motor movements rather than picking up a cube to fit in a circle, I have seen their elder siblings plug in their Dr. Dre Beats earphones, switch between snapchat windows and emails and messengers, listening to their tracks and maneuvering around their surroundings without bumping into anything and at the same time stuffing something into their mouths to eat/drink. How? And when? Did this change happen.

The Elon Musk fans of the world will rejoice with AI taking over soon enough, people going into space and the next wave of technologically hitting us faster than the previous one has even been processed.

I wish I could be at the stage when I can unknot all of these back to where we began with. Simpler times, more physical interactions and mental stimulations, a lot less rancid when it comes to tuning in to the things around us – the old adage ‘sometimes you’ve got to stop to smell the roses’ is as important to practice rather than retell.

On that knot-e my long drawn obsession with perfecting all forms of bread, which I love, is relentlessly successful. Baking requires such patience and perseverance that it’s virtually impossible to be preoccupied or multitasking when kneading dough or watching it cook in the oven. It’s one place I can absorb myself wholly into and love it when I do.

I love dinner rolls and specially the knotted ones. I think its more to do with the shape and its complicated tearing off that excites every sense, not to forget the soft, spongy almost pillowy bread which is great to butter up and devour. It’s lightly sweetened, savory and goes well to dunk into soup or eat whole stuffed with your favorite sandwich ingredients. But the best way to have this is with a slather of garlic butter and lightly re-toasted (garlic bread #FTW).

Here I share a much worked on recipe and one I make quite often when I have guests over for dinner. Try this the next time you feel like baking something fun, its rewarding – and what do you know? You might just have a new topic to chat about with those dinner guests and help keep their gadgets away.

Knotted Dinner Rolls

Ingredients

• 1 cup Milk
• 1/2 cup Water + more for binding (lukewarm)
• 1 packet (7gms or 2-1/4 tsp.) instant Dry Yeast
• 1/4 cup Olive Oil
• 1/4 cup powdered sugar
• 2 tablsp Salted Butter
• 5-1/4 cups White flour (Maida)
• 1 tablsp Salt
• 1 Egg + 1 Egg for brushing
• Sesame Seeds & Poppy Seeds for topping

Method

For the dough and proving

1. Heat the milk, water in the microwave for about 30 seconds till its lukewarm (it should be warm enough for your finger and not scalding hot). Add a spoon of sugar from the 1/4 cup reserved and whisk. Stir in the dry yeast and let sit till its nice and foamy (if it does not foam, you will have to restart using another yeast – do not skip this)

2. Whisk oil, butter and the sugar to make a slurry. Set aside.

3. In a large bowl combine the flour and salt. Make a hole and drop in the egg beating it with a fork lightly. Add the foamy yeast now and start mixing it up. The yeast liquid should kind of get absorbed, around this time add the oil-butter-sugar slurry and start binding well. You have to get a supple, very elastic feeling dough. You will have to adjudge by adding more water (lukewarm) into the dough binding till you get a pliable dough (I added another 1/2 cup by the time I was done). The reason for this is every flour works differently and your local variety might need more water to bind.

4. You need to workout your arms and start squishing the dough against the palm of your hands and keep bringing it together. Its best to work in a large bowl or on a flat platform. This leads to the release of gluten which is very essential to your bread being nice and soft with a lovely hole-ridden inside due to the air pockets.

5. You will notice that your ball of dough is turning into a glossy ball of stretchy goodness. At this point dab a knob of soft butter in the center of the ball and rub it all over, bringing the edges together and forming a nice tight ball.

6. Place this in a largish vessel, cover with a wet muslin cloth and leave aside for atleast 2-3 hours for it to rise to nearly 2.5 times its size.

For shaping the knotted rolls

1. Line your large baking tray or two trays (if you have a smaller oven) with parchment paper, rub this with butter and have it stick to the tray.

2. Divide the dough into 12 equal balls and roll each one into long strips of about 12 inches.

3. Now as if you were making a knot for a bow, gather the two ends and twist them into a knot. You should get a large no. 8 shape. You can pull the ends and shape it deftly as you place it on the parchment covered baking sheet. It will be easy to shape but not easy to reshape so do you bit of prodding beforehand itself.

4. Complete all 12 of these equally the same way, you will observe that the knotted creations are quite small in size compared to what a bread roll should look like. Worry not, as this is before the second proving. You must place each roll quite well away from each other as they will puff up into full size balls of bread once proved and baked. About 1.5” gap is good between each one.

5. Cover the rolls once again with a wet and squeezed musing cloth and leave for about an hour in a warm muggy space. They will puff up and are ready to bake.

To Bake

1. Preheat oven to 190C.

2. Beat 1 egg with a tsp of milk and with a brush, dab each roll with the egg mix till you have a nice coating on all of them.

3. Sprinkle your seeds on each roll and pop into the pre-heated oven for about 14-18 minutes. Depending on the kind of oven you using, you may have to rotate the trays to get an even browning on all sides. You will know these are done when the outside surface is nice and golden and a delicious baking smell emanating from the oven.

4. Remove and brush with melted butter while they are still hot (this will give a deeper brown and lock the freshness of the bread inside without losing essential moisture). Immediately remove on to a wire rack and let cool a bit.

5. You are welcome to place them in dinner napkins rolled into baskets quite immediately if you time these well enough for your to serve them in time for your meal.

Nonchalant Note

• To get a softer mellower inside of bread, place an ovenproof bowl filled with water in the bottom of the oven. This allows a steam environment to be created and locks essential moistures into the oven while baking. This is a bit of a tricky method but works like a charm.
• If you don’t eat egg, you can avoid it in the batter and the brushing, just replace it with 1.5 tsp of baking powder. For brushing, you can use milk and them finish it off with butter as suggested.