Bread!

"When it comes to gettin' bread I got the keys to the bakery." That is the opening line to the song "Poppin' my Collar" by Three 6 Mafia. I thought that was fitting for this post. Plus it's a cool song. What I'm working my way up to is the simple fact that I love bread. And the great thing is I know I'm not alone in this. Need proof? Go to your grocery store. There is at least one aisle dedicated to just bread.

As much as I like eating bread, I get the most pleasure from making it. There are lots of fun ways to cook in the kitchen. Baking always felt right with me. When I first started making breads in culinary school, I knew that was a perfect fit. It just seemed so cool to start with ingredients that will do nothing on their own and create something so wonderful.

I also know that making bread is like kryptonite to many cooks, be it professional or at home. If you were to tell someone "Bake bread or get shot in the arm!", they would probably load the gun for you. Seriously, most people are scared shitless to make bread. Logically, we shouldn't fear bread. Humans have been making bread for a VERY long time. Long before Kitchen Aid. Long before electricity. If the ancient man could figure out how to make bread, I'm pretty sure the modern man with mixers and youtube can manage just fine.

If you are feeling adventurous and want to try your hand at bread making, my advice is start with pizza dough. There are tons of recipes out there for it. It's also a very straight forward recipe. You can produce pizza dough in just a couple hours. No overnight resting needed.

Before I get down to business, there is one last little topic I want to bring up. That is aroma. People always talk about how good bacon smells being cooked. To me, NOTHING beats the smell of fresh baked bread coming out the oven. The whole house is just perfumed with the awesome aroma of bread. Especially if you happen to make a herb bread. It just can't be beat.

Now, as we start this journey from dough to bread, lets get some issues out the way. First off, this is not a short process. It took around 3 hours to complete. These things take time and there's no getting around this. Second, I couldn't get all the pics I wanted because I only have two hands. There are times when I needed both hands for kneading, so I'm gonna try and explain as best I can.

Here is the recipe for Rosemary Bread:

3/4 oz                            Active dry yeast
1 1/2 cups                     Warm water
1 1/2 tbs                        Sugar
1/3 cup                          Olive Oil
2 tbs                              Freshly chopped rosemary
1 tbs                              Salt
1lb 4oz                          Bread Flour
                                     Egg wash

First thing to do is mix your yeast with warm water and about 1/2 the sugar. The water should not be piping hot. It will kill the yeast. If you need exact temps, it should be between 90 and 115 degrees Farenheit. Stir well and let sit about 5 to 7 minutes. It should be bubbly and foamy.

While the yeast is doing its thing, get all your other ingredients together.

The only thing not pictured is the olive oil.

Once the yeast has bloomed, add in all the dry ingredients and the olive oil. Attach the dough hook to the mixer and start on the slowest speed. Once it looks like everything is combined, turn it up to a medium speed and mix for about 8 to 10 minutes.

As it's mixing, you are gonna see some things happen. It's gonna look like a thick batter at first. Then it's gonna start clinging to the hook and looking more and more like a dough. Near the end, the sides of the bowl should be about clean and most of the dough will be climbing up the hook. When this starts to happen, turn off the mixer and reach in there to scrape down the dough. Turn the mixer back on if you are not at the set mixing time.

When done, the dough should have a somewhat smooth surface and not be too sticky to the touch. It should look something like this.

When the dough is done, drop it on a very lightly floured board and knead a little to round it out to a nice ball. This part is a little tough to describe, so please forgive me if it sounds incredibly stupid. You know how guys will gesture with their hands to describe a girls phat ass? Kind of a circular motion starting from top to bottom? That is the kind of motion you need to do to round out the dough.

Now get a bowl and pour enough olive oil in there to coat the sides and bottom. Drop your dough in the bowl top first and then flip over. You want to make sure the top is covered in oil so it doesn't form a skin.

Now you cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a bench towel, and come back in a half hour. It should double in size and look like this.

From here you will punch the dough down to release the gasses.

Now cover and let rise for another 30 minutes. This time, after you punch the dough down the second time, take the dough out of the bowl and drop on your cutting board. Use a paper towel to get some of the excess oil off the dough. Cut the dough in half and round out each half into a tight ball. How well you round it this time will show when it comes out the oven. So no half steppin' this time!

When the dough is rounded, place on a lined baking sheet and brush with egg wash.

Now you have to let the dough rest for another30 to 40 minutes. Or until it has increased in size to a little less than double original size. When it has reached the right size, get a good serrated knife and score the top with 3 cuts, like this.

Now place in a pre heated 400 degree farenheit oven and bake for 35-40 minutes. Mine was done at 35 minutes. They say to check to see if your bread is done, it should sound hollow if you tap on the bottom of it. That's what I did to test mine, but I'm not afraid of burning myself either. If you don't want to pick up piping hot bread from your oven, just go with 35 minutes. Here is what it looked like out the oven.

Like a good steak, you can't cut into these things right away. Difference is you have to wait longer with bread. I waited about a half hour. I think that was a little too soon, but I couldn't take it anymore! The whole house smelled like sweet rosemary. I was going nuts! But it came out awesome! So savory and warm. This was made to sop up sauce! Or make a beautiful panini sandwich.

Here's a couple more pics to get the blood flowing south of the border!

This has been a hell of a journey. If you stuck around for the whole thing, mad props to ya! I hope you enjoyed this as much as I did. And if this inspires you to try your hand at bread, I know you will not regret it.

Until next time,

J. Miller