Encounters with Imagination – July 11 to 22

Posted by on Mar 06 2011 | art, education, Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto, Toronto Waldorf School, Uncategorized, waldorf teacher education, workshops

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Welcome parents, educators and artists interested in working with the imagination. The Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto has invited a team of internationally acclaimed artists and educators to offer a diverse selection of practical and artistic workshops. Each explores how the capacity for imagination can be cultivated to serve the arts and education and to enrich our lives. Enrol in one, two, three or four of these week-long workshops and savour your encounter with imagination.

The capacity for imagination is central to advances in all fields of human endeavour. Scientists, artists and educators alike rely upon creative capacities to forge new understanding and build healthy relationships. The cultivation of imagination is fundamental to Waldorf education, in which teachers and students alike are encouraged to perceive living interconnections between seemingly separate things. These reveal that individuals and objects are but a part of a whole meaning-filled world. Imagination lifts the veil of materialism and offers insights into how to work holistically in any endeavour.

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I am the bread of life

Posted by on Feb 04 2011 | art, bread, bread oven, education, workshops

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Yes, I love to make bread.
I love to combine flour, water, salt and leaven.

I love the alchemy of how earthly substance combines with water; of how air is created by the leavening culture and how at last fire completes the transformation from four simple ingredients into whole loaves.

These are the staff of life.
I like the feel of the dough as I kneed it with my hands, how when I push it, it pushes back against me.

My life meets its life.
We shape one another.

But how, I wonder, am I the bread of life?
In what ways do I nurture the life in myself and in others?

Perhaps it is in those special meetings in which I knead the being of another and equally allow her to knead the essence of me.
I meet you.
You meet me.
Life!

There is a Japanese saying:
Friends eat together from the same bowl.

Let us then companions be.
Let us eat from the same loaf.
Kneading, forming, baking community.

Bake bread. Break it and share it out.

~Warren Lee Cohen

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Bread Oven Building workshop in King City, Ontario

Posted by on Dec 02 2010 | Baking Bread with Children, bread, bread oven, workshops

Here are pictures from a August 2010 Bread Oven Building workshop in King City, Ontario. It was a perfect hot and sunny weekend. We had an inspiring crew of 16 participants who were easily able to build two bread ovens in two days. The first oven we built quickly and fired it up the next day to make delicious pizza. We took our time with the second, added a number of details and enjoyed the process of collaborative sculpting.

laying fire bricks

We began laying our fire bricks on an artistically designed river stone base.

mushing the clay

Many feet make easy work of mixing recycled pottery clay,

clay subsoil, sand and straw into homogeneous cob to build the ovens.

making clay bricks

We kneaded the cob into loaf size bricks.

first layer of bricks

We placed the bricks around a form made out of sand.

We built it up like an igloo, molding the bricks tightly together.

second layer of bricks

We added a second layer of bricks for improved strength and heat retention.

It is essential that all the bricks of both layers are well kneaded together so that there are no air gaps. The structure becomes one monolithic dome.

sculpting

Artists at work.

The forms were dynamic connecting and influencing one another.

finished oven

Here is our finished oven complete with its oven spirit.

We removed the door and hollowed out the sand after all the sculpting was complete. This facilitated easy refinement of the doorway of the oven.

Thank you Leslie and Jamie for organizing the event. Enjoy your oven!

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Daily Bread

Posted by on Nov 30 2010 | bread, bread oven

No knead bread is a growing fad that gives more people entree into the art of baking bread. There are a number of very good videos describing the process on youtube . I find this idea both interesting and at the same time far from compelling. I simply love to have my hands in the dough, to feel its sticky sloppiness transform into soft elasticity as all the ingredients meet one another and come together into a lively dough. Kahlil Gibran wrote that work is love made visible.  So too is bread love made visible.

bread

So, I choose to knead my bread dough (all except for sour rye which is happy with a vigorous stir). It is good exercise and meaningfilled and the results are more pleasing in terms of crust and crumb. Nevertheless, from these video clips  I have learned to bake my slowly risen loaves in a well heated cast iron pot with lid. This simple technique produces crusts that rival those of my best bread ovens.

  1. shape mature dough into large loaf  (18 to 36 hour preliminary and 2 to 3 hour final rise – depending on temperature of the house)
  2. place cast iron pot and lid in oven at 500 F.
  3. using well floured hands transfer loaf into pot
  4. cover and put in oven for 20 minutes
  5. uncover pot and lower oven temperature to 400 F.
  6. bake for 15 to 20 minutes
  7. let cool and admire remarkably beautiful crust

crust

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Being a Waldorf Teacher

Posted by on Nov 09 2010 | education, Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto, Toronto Waldorf School, waldorf teacher education

Waldorf: Being a Teacher

I have been fortunate to be involved with Waldorf Education for the past 20 years. Not only is it a continuous source of inspiration for me, I have witnessed what a unique and wonderful approach to education it is. Children excell there in many faceted ways. Now that I have my own children, I could not imagine a more perfect school setting for them. Waldorf schools value childhood, protect their innocence, allow for creative play and foster the healthy development of imagination. They offer offer children opportunities to develop a broad range of skills, social/emotional maturity and conceptual depth that they will need for life. This truly is a broad based education rooted in the arts that  fosters balance, empathy, creativity and ultimately human freedom. It has been tested and refined over the past 90 years.

As a teacher, I feel that to be entrusted with professional task of looking after the well being of a group of students over a period of eight years. It is an awe inspiring responsibility and one for which I am eternally grateful. I could not now imagine a more satisfying or meaningful vocation than that of teaching in a ‘Waldorf school. As the director of teacher education at the Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto I do have a vested interest; nevertheless, these sentiments do come directly from my experience and from my heart. I welcome any inquiries and/or questions.

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Dragon Bread for Michaelmas

Posted by on Oct 13 2010 | art, Baking Bread with Children, bread, education, Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto, Toronto Waldorf School

Dragon Bread 2010 [3]

I was invited to bake Dragon Bread with the first grade at the Toronto Waldorf School. The 25 students, their teacher and a few very helpful parents were delightfully enthusiastic to get their hands into the dough and to shape their imaginations into wholesome and tasty loaves of bread. Some chose to make their dragons spiky and scary others saw them as more amiable creatures, waiting to be of service. None had difficulty kneading and shaping their creations. they made them in the morning and we were able to bake them for lunch. They ate a part of it and took the rest home to share with their families. Whenever I see any of the students they are sure to ask me when we will be baking again. Children simply love the meaning-filled task of baking bread especially when it is done with imagination and love. They sense the rightness of it and are  eager to participate from the initial sticky dough all the way to eating the delicious crust and crumb.

And, while making 25 smaller dragons why not make a really large one? In response to a special request from Jef Saunders from Arscura School of Living Art, I made the largest Dragon Bread that I have yet attempted: sourdough with raisins and dried cranberries, jewels in the belly that was decorated with almonds. It was fun to make and according to many reports from their Michaelmas celebration delicious to eat. The photo is courtesy of Vibeke Ball. Thank you to one and all for a fun baking day!

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Yet another reason to bake your own bread #2

Posted by on Sep 29 2010 | bread, education

Is this bread really food or is it the clever brain child of a chemistry lab?

Whole grain white bread???

Look at the ingredient label below.

In what bread recipe that you know is their more water than flour (usually it is 2 to 1, flour to water)?
Since when is Cottonseed fiber a food?
High fructose corn syrup is not a food!
Neither is soy fiber!
And then there is the whole list of other unpronouncable goodies…

Ingredients:  WATER, WHEAT FLOUR, COTTONSEED FIBER, WHEAT GLUTEN, HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP OR SUGAR, YEAST. CONTAINS 2% OR LESS OF: CALCIUM CARBONATE, SALT, BARLEY MALT, VINEGAR, NATURAL FLAVOR, CALCIUM PROPIONATE (TO RETAIN FRESHNESS), SODIUM STEAROYL LACTYLATE, CELLULOSE GUM, SOY FIBER, ETHOXYLATED MONO- AND DIGLYCERIDES, MONO- AND DIGLYCERIDES, MONOCALCIUM PHOSPHATE, SOYBEAN OIL, SOY LECITHIN, YEAST EXTRACT, B VITAMINS (NIACIN, THIAMINE MONONITRATE (B1), RIBOFLAVIN (B2), PYRIDOXINE HYDROCHLORIDE (B6), FOLIC ACID, VITAMIN B12), CALCIUM SULFATE, FERROUS SULFATE (IRON), CALCIUM DIOXIDE, VITAMIN D3, VITAMIN E ACETATE, ZINC OXIDE, AZODICARBONAMIDE, ENZYMES, SOY FLOUR, STEVIA EXTRACT (NATURAL SWEETENER), WHEY.

Why choose this when all it takes to make nutritious bread is flour, water, salt and leaven?

Keep on baking!

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Yet another good reason to bake your own bread…

Posted by on Sep 28 2010 | bread

A dead mouse was embedded into the bread and already sliced.
Ready to eat?!

Premier Foods was ordered to pay nearly £17,000 in fines and redress after a man found a dead mouse in a loaf of bread as he made sandwiches for his children. A more worrying detail was that the tail was missing and presumably eaten for lunch the day before.  For full article click here

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Fire and Bread – bread baking workshop September 26, 2010

Posted by on Sep 04 2010 | Baking Bread with Children, education, Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto, Toronto Waldorf School, workshops

Come explore the art of baking bread using whole grains and natural leaven, sourdough starter. We’ll bake a variety of breads using the same simple sourdough culture. We’ll touch upon the aspects of baking that create healthy and nutritious bread and, of equal importance that allow for joy and meaning in the baking process. You’ll learn how to make and use your own sourdough culture. You’ll take home fresh baked bread, sourdough starter and inspiration for future baking.

Toronto Waldorf School
Kitchen (downstairs)
Sunday September 26, 2010
10:00 am to 4:00 pm

Course fee $75 (includes all ingredients, bread and starter to take home)

To register please contact Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto
Tel. 905 764 7570
info@rsct.ca

Fire and Bread workshop

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Deep Nourishment of Baking Bread Together

Posted by on Aug 26 2010 | art, Baking Bread with Children, bread, education, workshops

 

Breaking Bread Together

I have received the most touching responses from my Art of Baking Bread and an Evolving Picture of Human Consciousness workshop this summer. Baking bread together can be spiritual work that nourishes us body, soul and spirit. It is enlivening, awakens the senses and can be a whole lot of fun.

Hi Warren,

I had the pleasure of meeting you and your family at the RSI this summer. From the evening session in which you showed how to bake bread, the guidance of your book and the great bread starter that you gave me, I am baking very nutritious breads for my family (at least once a week): corn bread, plain bread, apple bread, scones and even pizza. I have not bought bread since I started baking! Every time I make bread I feel I ma meditating. It is a wonderful experience that I have never had while cooking. I dare to say that it feels like a spiritual practice. My children also help and I am trying to help them deepen their relationship with what they eat. 
Thank you for all your work and for inspiring others. 
Best wishes, 

Alejandra

Hello Alejandra,

What a beautiful testament to the deep nourishment of baking bread and sharing this gift with others. Thank you so much for this note. I will cherish it and likely share it with the people who are gathering with me this weekend to build bread ovens and bake pizza together. This work of baking together continues to amaze me in its power to to cultivate spiritual companionship.

Blessings on the bread
Warren

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