Bread Makes The Meal

I haven't made bread for quite a while. Largely because Nancie's food has been so good, and so plentiful, that we've been eating mostly leftovers for lunch, not sandwiches. (We have a lot of stew in the freezer; I should see how dinner rolls will go over.) So Sunday I went back and made the basic Amish White bread. I don't know what happened, but Everything Went Wrong . The bread didn't rise adequately, it started drying out, and when I tried to roll it out and roll it up into a loaf, it wouldn't stay together. Baked, it started falling apart. I don't think I've "lost my touch", but it was a very disappointing experience. The bread has a good taste, but it's very dense. I don't even have pictures; it's too annoying. Actually, dinner rolls sounds like a great idea; I can use some of the rye flour for them. Do you think I need to make the whole sourdough starter, or can I just mix the bread flour and the rye flour? God spe...

It's been a long time (almost a week!), and I was going to be showing you my newly revised recipe for Tuscan White Hearth Bread (made with water instead of milk, since we were out of milk, and with my buckwheat honey). But I think I seriously didn't bake it long enough. It was quite not done in the middle, and I think that's what made me sick for the first couple of days of this week. The last couple are a different story; but I think most of my "feeling ill" yesterday and today is mostly a second- or third-order consequence of not getting quite enough sleep—and trying to make up for that with several cups of tea. Let's just keep in mind for the future, shall we, that if a recipe calls for a pan of water to provide steam, I'll automatically bake it an extra ten minutes or so. This weekend, I plan on (a) making some kind of well-baked bread, and (b) finally finishing up the garden for the season. Oh, and celebrating our anniversary. Looking forward t...

"Boughten" bread. On Sunday—though we didn't eat it until tonight. It's not that I couldn't have made it. We just haven't had a whole lot of time recently, and we picked our menu for today (meatball sandwiches) kind of hastily. So we had no bread in the house, and I happened to see this walking by the bakery department. By this evening it had started hardening (which I hadn't entirely expected), so we reheated it and split it for the sandwiches. I also got it because I thought I might like to try and imitate the loaf, if it was any good. Well, it was; but I'm debating whether to go ahead with the idea. My idea of "Country White Bread" has a bit softer crust, and something that doesn't dry out quite so quickly. Maybe with a bit more sugar to it? I have a recipe for it in Everything Bread ; maybe I'll make that on the cookie sheet rather than in the loaf pan. Just an idea. What's the difference for you between Country...

And better, I think. See if you agree. Looking back, I don't see that I've ever posted Leslie Bilderback's "Amish White Bread" recipe. Assuming I haven't, here it is, then (unless she tells me to please take it down): Amish White Bread 1 cup warm water ⅓ cup sugar 1¾ teaspoons (1 packet) active dry yeast 1 cup flour 2 tablespoons oil (I usually use olive oil for flavor) ¾ teaspoon salt 2 more cups flour So start off by dissolving the sugar in the warm water (as always, not much warmer than body temperature) and adding the yeast. Stir until the yeast is all mixed in and go read a book or something for ten minutes. When the yeast is all foamed up on the top, add the oil, and then stir in the first cup of flour. When this is well mixed, add the salt, and then the other two cups of flour. Flour your surface, and empty the bowl out. You should have a soft, but fairly cohesive, dough. Knead this for eight or nine minutes. It'...

I thought I had some really good pictures for you tonight. What I actually have for you is some good evidence that it's difficult (for me at least) to take good pictures with a cell phone camera. Difficult enough that I'm going to go back to borrowing Nancie's mom's camera to take the pictures. But I'll post the pictures because I want to at least show you something . I made the Milk and Water Bread over the weekend. It didn't go exactly as I had planned the recipe; the sponge was considerably wetter, and I let the dough rise for a lot longer (because we got occupied in making the slow cooker ribs). Didn't seem to hurt, though: The bread came out just as tasty. After all that baking, I could hardly wait to eat! The next thing, obviously, was to use the bread appropriately, namely, to mop up the barbecue sauce from dinner: Fortunately, there was plenty of bread for all that sauce. Again, I apologize for the poor quality of the pictures. But...

(Posted from my phone) I'm making bread (the Milk and Water Bread).  It's just out of the oven; I'll add a picture after it cools.  I'll also add a picture of the incoming hurricane clouds.  It's on Nancie's camera right now. I agree with something a friend said.  I imagine we will lose power, and I'm not looking forward to it, not because we're not ready (we are) but because I don't like being in the dark. Stay well, God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less wi th bread.

The Tuscan White Hearth Bread looked good (apart from being odd-shaped) and when I first cut it open (my pictures of the crumb all turned out blurry) it looked good, smelled good, tasted good. But on the inside It Was Uncooked Again ! Argh! What am I doing wrong? The oven doesn't seem to be unusually cool—we baked homemade macaroni and cheese a couple of days ago and I was concerned the oven was running a little high, if anything. Am I not leaving the loaf in long enough? It was starting to get beyond golden brown; I didn't want it to burn. I'm not sure what's going on, and I'm really frustrated . Nancie doesn't like the bread because it seemed almost raw in the middle. Should I just toss it and chalk it up to "experience"? Deep breath. Must take a deep breath :-) God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less with bread (properly baked, of course).

I did in fact finish the Tuscan White Hearth Bread last night. I let it rise for two hours before dinner then put it in the fridge over dinner. So it rose for another hour in there. I punched it down, and tried shaping it into a boule. Didn't work very well. Apparently I didn't follow my instructions, kind of folded the dough up, and when I tried to roll it, it tore. But okay, whatever, I thought; I went ahead and crosshatched it per the recipe. Then when I baked it ...! I thought I had a picture to insert here, but I must have missed it. Let's just say that although it did come out golden brown, it looks like it's one loaf sort of "budding off" a smaller loaf (perhaps it's reproducing, like yeast?). Next time I'll carefully attend to the instructions that I actually gave people :-/ I still have to see how it tastes; I'll do that this afternoon when I come home. But it smells delicious, and I'll call it a success.

For those of you who were hoping for another post on my bread yesterday, apologies; I didn't finish the bread until well after 11:00 PM, and didn't get into bed for another hour. So I'm exhausted this morning. So anyway, yesterday I did decide to do the Milk and Water Bread from the Bread and Fancy Breads book I found on Google books. Again, here's the recipe exactly as it appears in the book: Dissolve one yeast cake in quarter of a cupful of lukewarm water, stir in enough flour to make a batter, cover and leave to rise. Mix together a cupful of scalded milk, a cupful of boiling water, a tablespoonful of lard, an equal quantity of butter, and a teaspoonful and a half of salt. Stir this mixture into the sponge and add five cupsful of sifted flour, or one cupful of white flour and enough entire wheat flour to knead. In the latter case add also three tablespoonsful of molasses. This bread may be mixed, raised and baked in five hours, and should be mixed in the morni...

I don't usually make bread during the week (I could , but we'd rapidly run out of space to store the bread!). But last night I did, just plain white bread for sandwiches today. I have to watch myself carefully. I'm not taking the time I need to shape the bread; it doesn't look as nice and even as it should. But it's got a lovely crust, a bit sweetish, and should make a great sandwich. Herself (who has informed me that she would like to be referred to forthwith as Nancie) made a great sandwich on this for lunch. She is the Sandwich Queen :-) Buffalo chicken, lettuce, tomato, mayonnaise, and a wee little bit of pepper. I can't wait for lunch! I was going to post something about the awful state of my bread ingredient cupboard, but this has cheered me up enough that I don't feel like griping about it :-) God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less with bread .

That's the book from 1917 that I'm doing tomorrow's recipe from. You can find it on Google Books; I'm using the recipe for "Milk And Water Bread". Dissolve one yeast cake in quarter of a cupful of lukewarm water, stir in enough flour to make a batter, cover and leave to rise. Mix together a cupful of scalded milk, a cupful of boiling water, a tablespoonful of lard, an equal quantity of butter, and a teaspoonful and a half of salt. Stir this mixture into the sponge and add five cupsful of sifted flour, or one cupful of white flour and enough entire wheat flour to knead. In the latter case add also three tablespoonsful of molasses. This bread may be mixed, raised and baked in five hours, and should be mixed in the morning when the cook is able to watch the dough as it rises and to keep it at a uniform temperature. The bowl containing the dough may be placed in a pan of water, keeping the water between 95° and 100° Fahrenheit. Many cooks who have not proved them...

I realized that over the weekend I didn't get to stir my sourdough starter—and I missed a feeding. So I was a bit hesitant last night to lift off the (by now very dry) cloth I keep over the starter bowl. I shouldn't have worried. It didn't look particularly different, or smell "off". I took out a cup, added a half cup of flour and half a cup of water, and stirred. This morning, it looked like this: (All those little spots are air bubbles; the picture didn't turn out great.) So the starter is alive and kicking, I'm going to make another couple of boules tonight or tomorrow—and tonight I'm definitely making the Amish white bread. Horror of horrors, we actually had to buy Store White Bread (for $4.50!) last night. So I'll have to do something about that. And as I still can't find the Sally Lunn recipe (but then again, you saw what the desk looks like—it could be anywhere there...) I'm trying not to bake too much bread; we only have so m...

The starter is doing really well (day 6). It was foaming up earlier, and I stirred it once. It seems to have gone very liquid; I'm not sure that's right, it had a much thicker consistency yesterday. I usually bake bread on Sundays, but today we had a little bit of a party - an early Independence Day party, more or less. So tomorrow I'll be baking, and I was looking over things I haven't done from the Everything Bread cookbook. Butter Top? Farmhouse White? Honey White? Hawaiian Bread? I'm not sure how much butter we have in the house - if I get desperate (and only if I get desperate) I could substitute margarine; but I'd rather walk down to the store, if it's open. What's your preferred sandwich or toasting bread? Anything special? God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less with bread .

What I made today (I thought I had pictures but I don't see them on the camera) was just a plain Amish white bread. Lots of sugar to get the yeast kicked up, a fairly short rising time - just barely an hour - the bread is soft, noticeably crusty but not hard, just a little bit of sweetness. Perfect for sandwiches. What's your favorite sandwich bread? So Esteis likes the idea of a dense, heavy bread. I was looking for the opportunity to start a sourdough starter. Herself likes rye bread. So when I combine all three of these, I come up with: German Rye Bread. I actually have a new bread book that a neighbor gave me - thanks, Stacy! - which has a very interesting-looking description. So I'll get the ingredients together and get the starter going in the next days. This should be very interesting (if the cats don't get into it)! God speed, and remember: All sorrows are less with bread. Edit: I couldn't find the pictures. And updated the text to reflect that th...