Bread Baking. It's time, y'all!

OK, so, not everyone is a baker.  Or wants to be one. Yeast breads in particular take up several hours of your day and have a notorious reputation for being difficult.  If, however, you are a label-reading food shopper, you know that bread with wholesome real ingredients is expensive--and I suspect that when you proudly bear your first loaf from the oven and taste a still-warm slice, you will wonder how you ever tolerated the lifeless stuff on the grocery shelves.

[Warning:  if you find yourself converted from store-bought sandwich bread, you may be at risk for venturing into other, equally delicious realms of bakery.  Flat breads, tortillas, cornbread, crackers, quick breads, english muffins--they are all fantastic when homemade.  Carb heaven, I tell you.]

I must confess:  I love the alchemy of yeast.  I rarely proof my yeast now because I use instant rather than active dry yeast, but if you are new to baking, I think a few rounds of watching the active dry get all bubbly is inspiring.  It is kind of like gardening...with fungi...at a microscopic level...on super fast-forward steroids.  I may just be weird about this, but there is something about taking the rough dough, kneading it until it is supple, and then watching it grow and change and bake and change again that is half science experiment and half mysterious transformation, ruled ultimately by the gods of warm rising spots and fickle yeast.

Right.  Moving on.  Sorry.

I grew up watching and helping my mom bake bread, so in many ways, a house that smells like baking bread signifies "home" to me.  I know that yeast gets a bad rap, and I would have to recommend bypassing cheap supermarket yeast packets that have been sitting at room temperature or hotter for god knows how long--make a $6 investment and buy some good instant yeast.  It should be kept in the freezer, but I prefer working with it--there are more live cells in it than the active dry and so it responds faster and you can use less.

OK.  Here is the basic sandwich bread recipe that I grew up with.  It is my mother's, it makes two loaves, and it is the most delicious toast or grilled cheese ever.  It is originally written as part white flour and part whole wheat--for the lightest results, that is probably how you should try it.  If you would like to make it entirely from whole wheat, as I do, that works too--I like the new "white" whole wheat that you can get from King Arthur Flour and Bob's Red Mill and that Trader Joe's sells as well.  You can add a few tablespoons of vital wheat gluten (available from King Arthur & Bob's also) if you would like to help the loaves rise a bit more.

If you have a heavy-duty stand mixer, like a Kitchen-Aid, then you can mix up the ingredients and also let the mixer do the kneading for you.  It took me a long time to accept this, but a mixer or a bread machine will produce a lighter whole wheat loaf than hand-kneading does...but much of the pleasure (and exercise) of bread baking comes from kneading the bread the old-fashioned way.  I say, try both ways and become proficient at both.  When you want to savor the experience, knead by hand; when you want to be more speedy or efficient, let the machine work for you.  Remember:  even though the bread requires some time to rise, you have very little work to do once you've mixed up the ingredients and kneaded the dough--spend the rising time doing other stuff around the house or garden and suddenly you've accomplished a bunch of chores and you end up with yummy homemade bread. 

And, a final note:  the abbreviations that I use for different measuring units are:  c. = cup, T. = tablespoon, t. = teaspoon.

Mom's Bread:

Wet Ingredients
4 T. (1/2 stick or 1/4 c.) butter/margerine
1 1/2 c. water
1/2 c. milk
1/2 c. cottage cheese
1/4 c. honey

Dry Ingredients
2 c. whole wheat flour
4 - 4 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
2 packages (4 1/2 t.) active dry yeast (or 3 1/2 t. instant)
1 T. salt

Prepare wet ingredients:  slowly melt the butter in a small saucepan over low heat, making sure it doesn't start to brown.  Add the milk, then the honey, water, and the cottage cheese, and stir occasionally until it is quite warm, but not too hot for the inside of your wrist--similar to checking a baby bottle.  If you want to assess it with a candy thermometer, it should be around 110 degrees.

If you are mixing and kneading by hand, mix three cups of the flour with the yeast and salt in a large mixing bowl.  Pour in the wet ingredients and stir until the flour has been incorporated.  I use a wooden spoon usually, but sometimes a large metal spoon is better at scraping down the sides & bottom of the bowl as you stir.  Add more of the remaining flour until the dough is too stiff to mix anymore by hand.  Prepare a clean counter top with a good dusting of flour and make sure that you have some elbow room.  Tip and scrape the dough onto the floured surface, dust the top with more flour and start to knead.

Kneading is done by folding the dough over on itself, pushing into the fold with the heel of your hand, and then turning the dough about a quarter turn or so and repeating (1. Fold  2. Push  3. Turn).  The dough will gradually become smooth and elastic rather than sticky and soft.  At first, the flour soaks in quickly and the dough gets sticky again--continue to dust the counter top and the surface of the dough as needed.  It is smart to measure out the remaining flour and try not to use more than that--the bread will be heavy and dense if you add too much flour, particularly when you are working with whole grains.  You can knead for a few minutes and then let the dough rest for 10 minutes--this allows the flour and water in the dough to combine a bit and will make the kneading a little easier.  Knead for 8-10 minutes, or until the dough is smooth and elastic.

If you are using a mixer, pour the wet ingredients into your mixer's bowl first, then add almost all of the dry ingredients--reserving about 1/2 to 1 cup of the flour.  Use your dough hook, and start mixing on low until the wet and dry are combined, then turn up a bit--either level 2 or 4 on a Kitchen-Aid and medium at most if you have a different machine.  Use a 1/4 cup measure to add the rest of the flour evenly around the edge of the bowl as it mixes, pausing for a few minutes between to let the flour incorporate.  After several minutes the dough will start to cling to the dough hook and not be sticking to the sides of the bowl--this is what you are aiming for.

Lightly grease a large mixing bowl.  Form the kneaded dough into a ball and put it in the greased bowl, turning it once to coat both sides with oil.  Cover with a kitchen towel or use plastic wrap that you have sprayed with oil on one side, and then drape, oil side down, loosely over the bowl.  Place the bowl in a warm spot (oven with pilot light burning, top of refrigerator, on a heating pad set on "low" and swaddled in kitchen towels) for 45-60 minutes, or until the dough has doubled in size.  (With instant yeast, start checking for size at 30 minutes.)

Turn dough out on a clean counter and gently deflate.  Shape the dough into a rough rectangle and cut into two equal pieces.  Pat the pieces in to loaf shapes, trying not to trap large air bubbles inside.  Grease two 9 x 5" loaf pans and place the loaves in them, with any seams on the bottom.  Cover again and let rise for 35-45 minutes.  Toward the end of the rising time, preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  When loaves have risen an inch above the rim of the pans (or the end of the rising time, whichever comes first), place in oven and bake for 35-45 minutes.  Loaves should be a deep brown on top and sound hollow when tapped.  Turn out of loaf pans and cool on a rack.  Keep in a large plastic bag after fully cooled.

And, voila!  Homemade bread. 

It is good that this recipe makes two loaves...if I haven't been baking regularly, we usually are overwhelmed by the yummy-ness and the first loaf seems to evaporate a few hours after baking!  Enjoy--and if you have any questions, I am happy to help.  Just post a comment or send me an email at mjgoeglein@msn.com.  Happy bread baking!

p.s.  One more fun fact:  the more you bake with yeast in your kitchen, the higher your loaves will rise--thanks to the wild yeast that starts living there.  The wild stuff lends a hand too.  Love it.