Food and the Four Elements:
Bread and Wine

by Emyme

The lightning cracks and the thunder rolls and they run from the open ground into the cave. A man, a woman, and two children. They gather around the large open pit, fire blazing, and dry off. This fire is never extinguished, tended by the old woman seated on a grass mat, a place of honor. Several families live in this cave. Their home, their community, carved from earth. Just outside the entrance to the cave sits a large log, hollowed out and coated with tree sap so as to be waterproof. This collects the rain that pours down, providing some of the water they use every day. Deep in the cave, a fresh cold spring bubbles up, another source of life-giving water. Surrounding them is air, the most basic of all needs—the air they breathe, the air that feeds the fire, the breeze that cools them in summer and carries the heat from the fire pit, which warms them in winter. The wind that brings the good smell of food and the warnings of predators.

The children lay more sticks across the fire pit and the younger woman commences to prepare a meal. She scoops kernels of grain from a large stone jar into a smaller stone bowl and grinds it into a coarse powder with a rock. Adding water makes a paste, which she then pours onto the smooth, hot stones by the fire—soon several flat, chewy discs of bread are ready. The women of the other families have been busy preparing vegetables and meats—each family brings something to the communal evening meal. Meanwhile, the men tend the containers fashioned from animal skins hanging just inside the opening to the cave, where the sun shines in a few hours almost every day. That sun has warmed the mixture of grapes and berries and water within those skins. Every few weeks, the mixture is tested, tasted—today it is finally sweet enough. The heat and air working on the fruit of the earth and water have created a potable liquid as if by magic. The heat and the air working on the grain from the earth and water have created an edible food—as if by magic.

And that is what is talked of—magic—as the families sit and eat around the fire, drinking the liquid in their earthen shelter, comfortable in the temperate air. Magic—the old woman, the matriarch of this clan, weaves a tale of gods and goddesses. She tells a story of the magic of the air and the earth and the water and the fire. She points to the bread and the wine and explains and exclaims how these are truly gifts of the heavens. Many of the clan have heard these stories before, but there is always some new twist or some new child to take in this wonderment, and so these tales are told again and again. No written language is created yet, but somewhere off to the side one of the children records pictures from the old woman’s stories, carving in a rock wall, or on a piece of wood, or painting with food dye on a leftover piece of hide. So we have come to know how early man created shelter and sustenance.

Air … Earth … Water … Fire.

Breath … Foundation … Hydration … Energy.

The elements are universally shared, and are integral to life—consider the Survival Rule of Three:

In any extreme, emergent situation, it is wise to recall one cannot survive more than three minutes without air, Three hours without shelter (earth/fire), three days without water, or three weeks without food (earth/fire).

The Four Elementals are fundamental to the earth-based belief system. We call upon them and bow to them in the casting of every spell. Great honor is awarded the elements, for they enable not just basic survival or getting by, but getting by with comfort.

References to and evidence of bread may be found in history going back more than ten thousand years. Grain was easily stored and transported, to be ground and prepared for baking wherever there was fire. At its most basic level, bread is made from numerous types of grain grown from earth, nourished by water (rain), air (breezes), and fire (the sun). This grain is gathered and separated, and the edible part is ground into a meal. The meal or flour is then again touched by earth through fermentation after adding water and then baked into a solid via air and fire. Bread is a whole food—with almost everything needed to live—that holds the four elements twice over.

As with bread, references to wine are found throughout recorded history. It has been and continues to be a potentially life-saving option in parts of the world with little or no potable water. Wine of the far past was most likely not quite as potent as the wine we now imbibe—even the young could and did drink it. Like grain, it too was easily stored and transported in a variety of containers. Grapes are grown from earth and nourished by water, air, and fire. Once harvested, the liquid is extracted and, similar to bread, fermentation is employed to complete the process of juice to wine. In this case however, fermentation involves earth and air and fire, all three at once. Again, it’s nourishment that holds all of the four elements twice over.

Recipes

To anyone new to an earth-based belief system, a kind reminder—any creation in a kitchen, be it food, drink, or spellcasting should begin with blessings and intention. Prepare your workspace, much as you prepare your altar. Ground and center. Bow to the directions. Call to the elements. Ask blessings from the Lady and Lord and your personal deity. Do not forget the Kitchen Witch!

First the Grain

Keeping with the theme of fermentation as part of the earth influence in bread, sourdough is a great example. It requires natural fermentation from bacteria, which is always in the air. This recipe, considered medium-complicated and time-consuming, takes about a week. But the results are incredibly delicious. There is nothing quite like the taste of homemade sourdough bread. Enjoy.

Make the Sourdough Yeast (The “Starter”)

The first step is mixing some flour and water. That is one-half cup of rye flour and one-half cup of wheat flour with one cup of warm water. Give it a stir and that is called the “starter.” This recipe calls for homegrown yeast, not any commercial yeast. Wild yeast in the air and the flour will create the yeast for this starter.

Cover the mixture loosely and leave it out at room temperature. Every twenty-four hours, take out and discard half, and add one-half cup of wheat flour and one-half cup of warm water. Continue for three to seven days until the starter is fermented and bubbling with wild yeast.

After those three to seven days, depending on the weather and your locale, the mixture will be bubbly and smell “beer-y” with a nice sour smell.

Make the Sourdough Sponge

Now to make the sponge. Pour the starter into a bowl and add one cup of bread flour and one cup of water. Cover that and leave it overnight. This is called a sponge, which is simply a fermented batter. This is used to make the dough.

Prepare the Sourdough Bread Dough

Give the sponge a stir and add two cups to a bowl. Then add:

1 teaspoon sugar

2 teaspoons salt

2 tablespoons oil

1 cup bread flour

Stir that up until it becomes wet, sticky dough. Add another cup of flour and that will make a dough firm enough to pour on to the cutting board. Then we’re going to work in approximately a cup of flour. Go by feel. Add a little at a time and keep kneading until you have a smooth, elastic dough. This should take about ten to fifteen minutes.

You know you are done if you can stretch a piece of dough and see light through it. This is called the “window pane” test. Once the dough is ready put a teaspoon of oil in a bowl and oil the bowl and dough so it doesn’t dry out.

The next step is allowing the dough to rise. Cover with a wet towel and let rise to double in size, about eighteen hours. Sourdough rises much slower than regular yeast dough. When it is ready, pat it down on the board, completely deflate it. Make it into a square shape and roll it into a loaf.

Put it onto a cornmeal coated pan (oiled, with two tablespoons of cornmeal shaken to cover surfaces), and place it seam-side down. Place an oiled piece of plastic wrap loosely over the dough. Let that double in size, between eight and twelve hours.

When that is ready make some slices in the top of the bread, about one-half inch deep, for looks and to help the bread rise. Put a pan of water in the bottom of a cold oven, and place the bread pan in that. Turn on the oven to 425 degrees F., and bake for forty to forty-five minutes.

Should you want a beautiful, blistered, crispy crust, spray with plain water a few times during the baking. When it is done it will have a hollow sound when tapped.

Now the Grape

The essential steps in winemaking can be summarized as follows (this is an extreme simplification):

Extract the flavor and aroma from the base ingredients by chopping, crushing, pressing, boiling, or soaking them.

Add sugar, acid, nutrients, and yeast to the fermentation media or liquor to achieve the proper ratio and ferment, covered, for three to ten days in a primary fermentation vessel (crock, jar, or polyethylene pail) at 70 to 75 degrees Fahrenheit.

Strain off the liquid from the pulp, put the liquid into a secondary fermentation vessel (a carboy or jug), fit a fermentation trap (airlock) on the mouth of the bottle, and allow fermentation to proceed at 60 to 65 degrees Fahrenheit until all bubbling ceases (after several weeks).

Siphon the wine off the sediments (lees) into another clean secondary fermentation vessel. Reattach the fermentation trap. Repeat after another one or two months and again before bottling.

When wine is clear and all fermentation has stopped, siphon into wine bottles and cork the bottles securely. Leave corked bottles upright for three to five days and then store them on their side at 55 degrees Fahrenheit for six months (white wine) to a year (red wine) before sampling. If not up to expectations, allow to age another year or more.

Air, Earth, Water, Fire: bread and wine. The elemental world embodied in historical tradition and magical nutrition and imbued with romantic love.

Air: obviously the air we breathe, the breezes and wind; the all important conductor of the heat in baking, and bacteria necessary for fermentation.

Earth: the medium in which seeds grow and become the grain and the grapes; on a much smaller scale the bacteria which enable fermentation.

Water: first, rain to nourish crops; then, any water called for in recipes; also water added to wine for everyday consumption.

Fire: the sun, encouraging crop growth; the heat produced during fermentation; and literal fire to bake breads.

The vignette at the beginning of this essay illustrates how humankind had progressed to a certain level of comfort. While it may seem primitive to us in the twenty-first century, that community had obviously evolved from merely scrabbling for nourishment to preparing it. This underscores another way to look at the elements, and their necessity in creating a higher level of food/sustenance. On almost every continent, early humans lived this life. Wheat, barley, rye, oats, and maize are just some of the grains used to make primitive breads. Grapes of white and red, and every shade in between, provided a nourishing (sometimes intoxicating) liquid.

Thousands of years later children hurry into their home as the storm breaks. Inside, logs blaze in the fireplace. Wonderful smells emanate from the kitchen. Friends and family gather, each bringing something to the communal meal. Loaves of bread cool on the counter. Bottles of wine breathe in the pantry. Bread baked and wine bottled in factories of sparkling white and chrome can be purchased the world over. However, this family prefers a more personal option. During the meal everyone exclaims over the taste and texture of home-baked bread. Everyone partakes of the home-brewed wine, with water added for the children. After the meal, there are requests for recipes, and some pause to look over the brewing system. Wood is added to the fire. Lively conversation ensues. In one corner a grandmother reads to youngsters about ancient history and magic. Off to the side a teenager is engrossed in a sketchbook. Throughout the human experience, from the cave to the twenty-first century home, this scene has repeated too many times to count. No doubt this will continue into the future. People gather to prepare and share their own slice of bread and cup of wine: home-grown magic from air and earth, water, and fire.