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| Breakfast yesterday morning |
There are few more comforting "comfort foods" in the world than fresh homemade bread. It's one of the rare foods that your enjoyment of is not diminished because YOU spent all day preparing it. Maybe it's just me, but I never seem to enjoy the food I make nearly as much as my husband. But maybe it's just like one of my sisters-in-law says, "hunger makes the best cook."
Homemade bread is special though. Maybe simply because it's a "treat" for us. I definitely don't make it every week, or we'd be even more spherical in physique than we are now. I think there's something more to bread though that gives it is special powers of wonderfulness. It is the food through which God made Himself present to mankind in all places for the rest of time, after all.
Anyways, that's enough heady talk for one post. On with the "method!" I don't use a recipe to make bread, I just go by eye-balling it and seeing what looks/feels right. One of my lovely sisters-in-law taught me how to make bread over 6 years ago now when I was a nanny for her and my husband's brother on their farm. I learned many homesteady things that summer on Two Trees Farm, like how to milk a cow by hand, how to muck out a chicken coop and sheep barn, how to trudge through a pigpen with four big, hungry pigs swarming around my legs, how to make
soap, how to cook up a gourmet meal from an empty pantry (although I've not mastered this yet,) how to be an unconditionally loving, gentle parent, and many other things.
Without further ado, here we go:
Pour 4 cups warm water into a large mixing bowl. You want the water temp to be something comfortable for the yeast to live in, not too hot, not too cold.
Sprinkle in enough yeast that it would about cover the top of the water. It will sink, but just sort of sprinkle over the area of the surface, it's probably about a tablespoon and a half or so.
Add 1-2 tbsp of sugar (you can use brow or white, honey or maple syrup) for the yeast to eat. (I'm sorry I don't have any pictures of this part, as I didn't think to post about it till half way through making it.)
Let the yeast "awaken" in the water for about 10-15 mins, or until the surface of the water is covered with the puffy yeast.
Add "a couple glug glugs" of oil (approx 1/4 cup,) an egg, about 1 tsp salt and 1-2 tbsp more sugar. Mix this all up with the yeasty water using a wooden spoon.
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| The blue egg is from one of our Ameraucana chickies, Libby |
I estimated I used close to 10 cups of flour in this batch which made four long loaves. Start with a bit of white flour because it works up the best gluten.
Put about 2 cups into the liquid mix and start mixing and stirring it in with your wooden spoon, once that's mixed, add about 2 more cups. You might have to put a bit of elbow grease into your mixing to work up the gluten till it's got a sort of elastic consistency.
The dough will be fairly wet at this point and now you can start adding whole wheat flour if that's what you're choosing to use. I use organic all-purpose and organic whole spelt flour from a local farm. You can also do all white flour.
Add another couple cups of your whole wheat flour and mix it in. You may want to start using your hands.
Once the dough has enough flour to handle without it sticking all over your hands, turn it out onto a well-floured surface. Start kneading the dough out into a long blob horizontally, put down more flour vertically and turn the dough onto it and start kneading the top down towards the middle and out longways horizontally again. I hope that is not too obscure sounding and you can picture what I mean. In any case, just knead your bread so that you're kneading in about 3-4 more cups of flour till you get a nice, springy ball of dough.
Pour a bit of oil in the bottom of your mixing bowl, plop the dough in and cover with a towel. Let it rise to about twice the size, maybe a bit bigger. Depending on the temperature of your house and where you place it to rise (will go faster in a warm place like near a fireplace/wood stove) it will take 30 mins or so, maybe longer.
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| I hate blog posts with too much writing and no pictures, so since my bread pictures were not very high quality, here's some gratuitous cuteness to break up the post. Please ignore the table covered in laundry. |
Once your dough has risen to approximately twice it's original size, turn it out on your counter. It doesn't need to be floured since your dough will have the oil from the bowl on it. Preheat your oven to 350 F. Twist the dough in half, do NOT pull or tear it apart. Then twist each half in half again so you have 4 balls of dough. One at a time, flatten the balls out into a rough square shape, about half and inch thick, maybe less.
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| Please forgive the terrible quality pictures...I really need a new camera. And a new kitchen with better lighting. |
At this point you can sprinkle any extras you want in your bread onto the dough. This batch is current spice bread, so I made a mix of about 1 1/2 tbsp cinnamon, 1/2 tbsp cloves, 1 tsp nutmeg and 1 tsp ginger, and I soaked the currents while the bread was rising so they were plump and juicey. I also sprinkled a bit of brown sugar with the spices and currents. You could substitute raisins.
You could also make cheese bread and put shredded cheese in. If you wanted to do something like sunflowers or sesame seeds or add oat or wheat germ or flax meal, I would do that as you're mixing in flour, before you start kneading the bread.
Once you've put your extras in, start rolling the dough along the top, tucking it in as you go.
Once it's all rolled up, pinch along the seam to close it up.
Then pinch your ends closed and fold over and pinch to the inside so your ends are rounded.
Place loaves, pinched side down on lightly greased cookie sheets, two to a sheet. You can let them rise a bit more on the sheets, or bake them right away. You can also bake them in loaf pans, just squish them up till they are short enough to fit. Bake until just browned on top. I usually bake for about 30-40 mins. My sister-in-law taught me to tap the bottom of the pan and you can hear when they are done. It's hard to convey that sound through writing though...
If you want to get extra fancy you can give the loaves an egg wash to get that shiny top. Just mix an egg in a little bowl with a bit of milk or water and brush over the loaves before you put them in the oven. I just use my fingers for this. You can then sprinkle sesame or sunflower seeds on top if you like.
I didn't get any pictures of the finished product (other than
my breakfast shot) because I probably got distracted by Rowan or
something. I should tell you that this is artisan bread, it's not light, fluffy bread like the crap you buy in the store which is full of extra gluten and other chemicals to make it perfect and fluffy. This bread is dense and hearty and satisfying.
Happy baking!
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