Minnesota Food Lover

Making Bread at Home by Jane Mason is perfect for the newbie to bread baking.  In the beginning of the book she goes through each essential part of bread making, but in a very encouraging way.  It put me right at ease especially when she said it was hard to mess it up and if it doesn’t turn out as planned, toast it. 

I made the simplest bread first because it had very easy steps.  She suggested to knead bread by hand at first instead of using a mixer with a dough hook.  Kneading by hand I could feel how the dough changed.  It was fascinating and exhausting.  10 minutes is a long time to knead for a beginner.

I was also drawn to this cookbook because of the recipe varieties from around the world.  In every recipe the author lists the ingredients in grams and cups or tablespoons/teaspoons.  I like to measure the flour by grams because it seems more accurate than cups.  I can use all the help available to decrease the amount of errors.  I haven’t been very successful with bread making, but I’m determined to change it!

Basic Steps for the Simplest Bread
One Small Loaf

300 g/2 1/2 c bread flour, whole meal, whole wheat or a mixture
3/4 t instant yeast or 1 t dried yeast
3/4 c plus 2 tablespoons water- warmed to 100-1100 F
1 t honey
1 1/2 t salt

If using instant yeast, put all the ingredients in a big bowl and mix together

If using dry yeast, put the flour in a bowl and make a well.  Sprinkle the yeast in the well, add the honey to 1/2 cup of the warmed water, mix and then add to the flour well.  Cover and rest for 15 minutes so the yeast can dissolve.  Add the rest of the ingredients and mix.

Take the dough out of the bowl and knead without any added flour for 10 minutes.  This part was really fun for me because I could feel the dough change as I kneaded.

After 10 minutes of kneading place the dough back in the bowl and cover.  Let it rise in a warm place until it doubles in size about 1-2 hours.

Pull the dough gently out of the bowl onto an unfloured surface.  Gently pull the dough into a square then fold the sides in to form a triangle.  Starting at the top of the triangle gently roll the dough into a tight sausage.  Pulling and stuffing.  It is hard to describe, but U Tube has many videos showing how to form dough into a tight sausage.  Place the dough into a small greased loaf pan.  Cover and let rise about an hour until it doubles in size.

Bake in a preheated 400⁰F oven for 40- 45 minutes.  If it sounds hollow it’s done or the temperature should be around 200⁰F.  Remove it from the pan and let it cool on a rack.  I spread some butter over the top when it came out of the oven and it was very nice.  Bread is perfect with bean or legume dishes- yum!