It's always been a dream of mine to make incredibly good homemade bread that's so good it makes me wonder why I ever settled for eating bread from the grocery store. I've tried many times before without a whole lot of success. Some, but not recently. My history with bread goes back to my childhood when I would watch my mom or my grandma whip together a few ingredients and magically produce a warm, satisfying loaf. I remember being so enthralled by it that I even did a science project on homemade bread when I was in 5th grade (or was it 6th? I've lost track) in which I made several batches, each time leaving out an ingredient to determine the effect it had on the bread. Good research opportunity that unfortunately doesn't do me any good with my efforts today.
When I got a little older, I started using my parents new bread machine--after all, all I had to do was dump the ingredients in and wait for the magic to happen. My favorite recipe was for Colonial Bread, which suddenly I'm inspired to look up and try my hand at again. It was dark and warm, sweet with the flavor of molasses, and hearty enough to make me feel like it was something worth being proud of. When I got older, my dear friend Molly bought me a bread machine of my own that I could take with me when we moved into our own little apartment up at school, and it worked wonders for me-both because it produced great bread, but it also made my soul feel warm and comforted. I still have it (but admit I haven't used it in ages).
I'm determined to make a loaf of bread the old fashioned way again, but I haven't been met with much success. I've had good results with cinnamon rolls, pizza dough, and quick breads (which are too easy to really put in the same category as yeast breads), but a good ol' fashioned handmade loaf of bread is much more difficult for me. It's extremely frustrating because I know how to do it, and yet...something always seems to go wrong. I think it must be the yeast or the temperature of the water. Perhaps one has gone bad and the other isn't the right temperature. Oh well. I will press on.
This week I found what looked like an incredibly easy, healthy, tasty whole wheat bread recipe (again, from http://heavenlyhomemakers.com/how-to-make-whole-wheat-bread-tutorial). It was easy, but again, it didn't rise for me. The frustration! When my husband Joey got home from work, I had a big lump of dough sitting on the counter mocking me. He asked what I was going to do with it and I told him that I was just going to throw it away (but I wasn't ready to do so quite yet. It was too sad for me.). He suggested I made flat bread out of it.
Oh, my clueless husband. Now, I don't know how to make flatbread, but I'm fairly certain it doesn't involve rolling out whole wheat dough that didn't rise and just sticking it in the oven to bake. Still, I humored him, if for no other reason than he was taking an interest in what I was doing and encouraging me to press on to find a way to put to use something that I didn't want to see go to waste.
I rolled out the dough and used a biscuit cutter to make little rounds. We greased a cookie sheet with a few spritzes of Pam and baked the little rounds for a few minutes at 350 degrees, and wouldn't you know? They turned out better than I would have ever expected. (Turns out Joey isn't so clueless after all.) They weren't fluffy because the dough hadn't risen, but they were soft and warm, easy to chew, and made a wonderful little bread to top with jam or dip in balsalmic vinegar and olive oil. (We actually had them dipped in homemade pesto that night because it's what I had made for dinner. So addicting!) We couldn't go through them all ourselves that night, so I threw them into the freezer to use another time.
So what's my point of all this? I struggle with making homemade bread. It's hard for me, but I will persist. I will go on. I will not let lousy yeast or my own self-doubt get in my way. But now I know that if it doesn't work, there's something that can be done with the "ruined" dough. (I made sliders for Joey today for lunch--a perfect use for these strange culinary creatures.)
When I got a little older, I started using my parents new bread machine--after all, all I had to do was dump the ingredients in and wait for the magic to happen. My favorite recipe was for Colonial Bread, which suddenly I'm inspired to look up and try my hand at again. It was dark and warm, sweet with the flavor of molasses, and hearty enough to make me feel like it was something worth being proud of. When I got older, my dear friend Molly bought me a bread machine of my own that I could take with me when we moved into our own little apartment up at school, and it worked wonders for me-both because it produced great bread, but it also made my soul feel warm and comforted. I still have it (but admit I haven't used it in ages).
I'm determined to make a loaf of bread the old fashioned way again, but I haven't been met with much success. I've had good results with cinnamon rolls, pizza dough, and quick breads (which are too easy to really put in the same category as yeast breads), but a good ol' fashioned handmade loaf of bread is much more difficult for me. It's extremely frustrating because I know how to do it, and yet...something always seems to go wrong. I think it must be the yeast or the temperature of the water. Perhaps one has gone bad and the other isn't the right temperature. Oh well. I will press on.
This week I found what looked like an incredibly easy, healthy, tasty whole wheat bread recipe (again, from http://heavenlyhomemakers.com/how-to-make-whole-wheat-bread-tutorial). It was easy, but again, it didn't rise for me. The frustration! When my husband Joey got home from work, I had a big lump of dough sitting on the counter mocking me. He asked what I was going to do with it and I told him that I was just going to throw it away (but I wasn't ready to do so quite yet. It was too sad for me.). He suggested I made flat bread out of it.
Oh, my clueless husband. Now, I don't know how to make flatbread, but I'm fairly certain it doesn't involve rolling out whole wheat dough that didn't rise and just sticking it in the oven to bake. Still, I humored him, if for no other reason than he was taking an interest in what I was doing and encouraging me to press on to find a way to put to use something that I didn't want to see go to waste.
I rolled out the dough and used a biscuit cutter to make little rounds. We greased a cookie sheet with a few spritzes of Pam and baked the little rounds for a few minutes at 350 degrees, and wouldn't you know? They turned out better than I would have ever expected. (Turns out Joey isn't so clueless after all.) They weren't fluffy because the dough hadn't risen, but they were soft and warm, easy to chew, and made a wonderful little bread to top with jam or dip in balsalmic vinegar and olive oil. (We actually had them dipped in homemade pesto that night because it's what I had made for dinner. So addicting!) We couldn't go through them all ourselves that night, so I threw them into the freezer to use another time.
So what's my point of all this? I struggle with making homemade bread. It's hard for me, but I will persist. I will go on. I will not let lousy yeast or my own self-doubt get in my way. But now I know that if it doesn't work, there's something that can be done with the "ruined" dough. (I made sliders for Joey today for lunch--a perfect use for these strange culinary creatures.)
No comments:
Post a Comment