I’d love to start baking my own bread, but the whole kneading process seems intimidating. Do you have any bread-making tips for me? – Lex, Appleton The secret to great bread is the texture, which is developed through both leavening and structure. In bread baking, yeast is the primary leavening agent used and works by READ MORE
Listening to ellis jake solie speak, it is very quickly apparent that she is an artistic soul. Her voice is soft and methodical, and her words are poetic. “I love things that seem magic. I feel like art is really good at that,” she says. As someone who can make even her own name into READ MORE
Nikisha Johnson, an Appleton painter, credits her early inspiration from watching her mother paint and take photographs. “I was always amazed watching her create something really beautiful and unique from the tools she used, whether it was a camera or print screen or a paintbrush, she always had a very intuitive sense in how to READ MORE
Appleton-based artist Lydia Andersen has had an interest in illustrations for much of her life. Throughout childhood, Andersen drew and illustrated short stories. Andersen has carried her artistic interests into adulthood by turning what was once her side hobby into a full-time career. “The Paint Chip Series” has been Andersen’s ongoing project since 2016. She READ MORE
“You don’t realize when you are faced with death and you don’t have a choice. It changes your life completely. You see things differently. You’re completely open because you have nowhere to hide. I’ve been given a second chance.” Looking at me through my computer screen, Menasha artist Karla Lauden professes the event that transformed READ MORE
Q. Now that I’m working from home, I’m looking for some easy weekday lunch ideas. Ideally they would be things I can make the night before and to help streamline the next day. Any ideas? – Peter, Kaukauna A. As a recent empty-nester still trying to adjust to cooking for two, my knee-jerk response is READ MORE
Classifying one as an art rebel is a bit redundant – haven’t painters, sculptors and makers long been the rulebreakers of society? But even within art, a practice rooted in creativity and disruption, conventions exist, traditions are followed and classics are celebrated. Megan Fredrich is having none of it. “The art scene is a little READ MORE
Painter Nate DeRidder creates work that functions as both art and activism. Environmental awareness and animal rights are common themes for the artist whose interest was sparked after reading “Food Matters” by Mark Bittman, a book that addresses environmentally ethical eating. “I did my own research after that and from there I researched climate change. READ MORE
Q. Is there a faster way to soften dried beans other than just soaking them overnight? – Martha, Kaukauna A. Soaking beans overnight to soften them is recommended, but it is not required. Soaking beans softens the starches in the beans which allow them to cook more quickly, but if beans are not pre-soaked it READ MORE
Sitting at Luna Coffee & Roastery in De Pere on a sunny, but freezing January morning, Jonathan “Cujo” Mojock takes the pen from my hand and scribbles a few notes to himself in my notebook. The notes are topics he wants to be sure to discuss during our interview. “I’ve always needed to pare down READ MORE
