Page - 32 - in Mobile Culture Studies - The Journal, Volume 4/2018

32 Mobile Culture Studies. The Journal 4 2o18 Katy Beinart | Khlebosolny/Bread and Salt the museum told us that her husband knew the locations of the old Jewish cemeteries in the area, and he offered to take us to visit them. We had also been in contact with a genealogist in the United States, Philip Shapiro, who had given us a basic mapping of the town and the loca- tion of the Jewish community who once lived there.55 Vilnius: Starter Culture and Khlebosolny (2012) Before we left Vilnius to travel to Rokiskis, we had made bread with our Starter Culture mix, using our South African salt and Lithuanian flour and water (figure 15). The local flour added a new ingredient to the culture, which so far had been made in South Africa, in the UK, and on board ship. We made two loaves to take on our journey to Rokiskis and Obeliai, the town and nearby village from which our research showed that the Beinarts came, and to carry out the Khle- bosolny threshold ritual we first performed at sea, en route to South Africa.56 Bread culture is a live organism that needs continual feeding and refreshing with flour and water.57 When the bread is baked, salt is added not only for flavour but also to tighten the gluten structure, since it strengthens the dough. It also helps the loaf to hold on to the carbon dioxide gas that is formed during fermentation, thereby sup- porting good volume. A baking website further notes: “Salt also slows down fermentation and enzyme activity in dough. The salt crystals draw water away from their environment (salt is ‘hygroscopic’). When salt and yeast compete for water, salt wins and the yeast is slowed down.”58 The balance of flour, water and salt is crucial, therefore, to the bread-making process and to the maintenance of the culture. 55 Conversation with Philip Shapiro via Skype, 27 July 2012. 56 See: Beinart, ‘Origination: Journeying In The Footsteps Of Our Ancestors’, p. 167, 170 57 Andrew Whitley, DO Sourdough: Slow Bread for Busy Lives (London: The Do Book Co., 2014). 58 Weekend Bakery website: <https://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/salt-in-bread-baking-how-much-and-why/> [accessed 2 August 2017]. Figure 15: Baking bread in Vilnius. Photograph: Rebecca Beinart. Source: author.