Then, I was snowed in. So I'm thinking to myself, what is a great thing to have when it's cold and snowy that's easy to make and that is basically fundamental to cooking but that I'll feel accomplished enough about making? Whenever I think, I think extensively.
Well, I decided on bread. I know it's technically baking and not so much cooking, but given the fact that I feel pretty comfortable about baking, I figured it was a great place to start. The recipe looked easy enough, and bread is something that just about everyone likes, and it could go with many, many, MANYMANYMANY dishes, so I went for it.
I had helped people make bread, before, so I kind of knew what to expect, but this was my first time flying solo, so it was definitely an experience.
I started off with something called "Milk Bread." This was something that I had helped someone make before, and even though we had done them as rolls, I decided to just make it as a 9x5 loaf this time. I did everything by hand in this recipe, and it got a little difficult once I added enough flour to make a sticky ball of dough (I had to switch from a spoon to using my hands). Milk bread is a denser bread that uses milk instead of water in the recipe. There's also an egg in there, and you dissolve the yeast before adding any ingredients.
Then, I decided to make some French Bread, since we make that all of the time in the grocery store bakery that I work in, and the recipe was just about as basic as you could get. It was just flour, yeast, salt, and water, and I decided to put this one on the mixer; it took about 10 minutes mixing on low speed. This one was a lighter bread.
Proofing the bread (letting it rise) always seems to be the hardest part of making it, and I found that I had to be a little creative here. This was definitely the part that made this process of baking bread time consuming, as the bread had to sit and proof for an hour in a bowl, and then I had to shape it/put it in a pan and then proof it about an hour more. It also didn't help that the ideal proofing environment is a warm, humid one, and I was in a dry, 60 degree house. I ended up turning the oven on the lowest temperature I could find, and then sitting the bowls of bread on top of the stove, covered in plastic wrap and with a towel. It worked pretty well, and it ended up proofing nicely, so I can't complain.
I baked the loaf of Milk Bread first, for about 35 minutes, and the smell was PHENOMENAL. It was a sweeter smelling bread, and it honestly would have tasted amazing with some honey butter on top. The best part by far was definitely the crust, which wasn't too dry, and seemed to retain a lot of the sweet and salty flavour of the bread (there was a bit of sugar in this one, and it was brushed with milk before baking). This would have made great sandwich bread, but the five people in my kitchen pretty much destroyed the entire loaf within 15 minutes, so I guess I have an excuse to make it again :)
(Milk Bread)
I was a little bit worried about the French Bread, basically because the first loaf was so good that I couldn't imagine making something even better, and also because I haven't exactly mastered the art of shaping bread dough into beautiful little loaves. It looked a little rough, and I didn't put anything onto the dough before baking it (just an egg white and water mixture five minutes before it was done). I wished it would have browned a little more, but honestly, once I tasted it, all of these meticulous little things went out of the window for me. Taste is really the most important part, covered by texture. It tasted wonderful, with a bit of a saltiness in the crust that tasted great, and the texture was that perfect light and fluffy stuff that one expects from bread. I enjoyed a piece of this with some creamy tomato soup.
Ultimately, the bread making was a success, and I will definitely be venturing out into some more complicated breads.
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