Monday, December 13, 2010

My Bread Recipe

Although I fail in many ways as a wife and mother, I do love to bake and cook. I've been promising a friend for months that I would post my bread recipe here on my blog. So here goes.... (this recipe came from my sister-in-law, Heidi, which came from Pantry Secrets located here in Utah). It is delicious and easy!


Pantry Secrets Bread Recipe

10 1/2 cups white bread flour or wheat flour (sift the white flour)

1/2 cup sugar or 1/3 cup honey

1 Tbsp. Salt

3 rounded Tbsp. Saf-Instant yeast (this is a special yeast that works with dry ingredients...it does not need to be proofed with liquids)

3 Tbsp. liquid lecithin OR FOR WHEATBREAD 4 Tbsp. liquid lecithin (this replaces oil...it tends to make the bread more moist)

4 cups hot tap water OR FOR WHEAT BREAD add 1 cup applesauce as part of water

Mix the dry ingredients. Add lecithin and water (don't measure the lecithin. Just pour and guess!)

Mix for 1 minute and check consistency. If dough is too dry, add more water. Dough should be very sticky and be sticking somewhat the side of the bowl. Mix for 5 minutes for white bread (10 min. by hand) or 10 minutes for wheat bread (20 min. by hand).

(I should go back and redo the picture above...maybe I will. The dough should be a little stickier!)

Do not add flour to the dough after it
has finished mixing. Spray the counter with cooking spray. Shape loaves and cover with a dishtowel.

Let rise 25 minutes. Bake at 350 for 25 minutes.

This recipe makes four loaves of bread. Use 4 x 8 inch pans.

I usually only make 2 loaves at once. My kitchen-aid seems to handle that better. If you have a bigger mixer, then 4 loaves at once would be great...less work!

Good luck! It's hard to go back to eating store-bought bread when this is so good and so easy. I also buy bread bags and ties and I freeze my extra loaves.

This recipe can also be used to make more delicious goodies...like dinner rolls, bread sticks, and cinnamon rolls. That post may be for another time.