baking day

Right after we moved into this apartment, I made a three-loaf batch of bread dough, baked two loaves and froze the rest of the dough. On Tuesday, we ran out of bread, so I thawed the frozen dough and ... discovered that it was pretty much dead. Boo! I *believe* that the trouble was that I had risen it three or four times already, so that by the time it unfroze, there was nothing left for the yeast to eat: I'm no scientist, but I guess that each rising increases the yeast and decreases the available food, so that if it rises too many times, the yeast will eventually starve. And I suppose that coming out of the freezer makes them especially hungry (it would make *me* hungry!). 

We had things going on Wednesday and Thursday nights, so - since it would be cruel to have the bread come out of the oven when Nick isn't home to enjoy a fresh-baked slice - baking day couldn't happen again until today.

Really, baking bread is a great activity during bar study: mostly the bread just sits there rising, so there's plenty of time for study; but every so often it needs prodding, so that gives a nice little study break. And it is so cheap and so good (compared to what is available on Guam) that I couldn't justify not doing it. 

I don't really use a recipe; my bread making method today went something like this: 

Get out the really big plastic bowl. Heat a couple cups of water on the stove until it is steaming. Pour it in the bowl with a little something sweet, a little salt, and then sprinkle in about a teaspoon of yeast (bought in bulk and stored in the freezer). 

Go study. 

Come back in a while and see if the yeast looks alive. If it does, grab the bag of flour out of the cupboard. Wash hands thoroughly. Use left hand to dip flour out of the bag, and right hand to mix flour into the water. Add maybe half a cup at a time until you've got a cohesive ball of dough. 

I like the challenge of using as little flour as possible - I believe I remember my mom telling me long ago about making Julia Child's french bread recipe, and learning from it that a good loaf will require much less flour that you think you need. So, I am always trying to use less flour than I think I need - I just mash and punch and knead the dough (still in the large plastic bowl) and see if I can get it to stick more to itself than to my hand. 

I don't take the dough out of the bowl to knead it - just knead, knead, in the bowl. I can even carry it to the computer and study while kneading! 

Then it's just - leave it in that same bowl, dribble some oil around to keep it from sticking; let it rise in as cool a spot as I can find, punch it down, let it rise, punch it down, let it rise - Nick should be getting home soon, at this point - punch it down and form it into loaves, rise it one more time, bake it on parchment on a cookie sheet, starting the oven hot and then turning it down to 350-ish, cook it until it's done. The whole enterprise only gets ONE BOWL dirty! Parchment on the cookie sheet means that even the cookie sheet stays clean, mwahahaha! 

So, the whole recipe is imprecise - I don't measure anything: a little yeast will grow to fit a lot of bread; you add flour until you've used up all the water, and bread just happens like magic. Last time I used nothing but flour, water, and yeast, a tiny bit of sugar and salt for proofing, and a dribble of olive oil to keep it from sticking to the bowl as it rose. It came out good, very bread-y; this time, I used honey instead of sugar, and used a little more of it; a little more salt, and threw in a little butter with the flour. I think it's pretty much impossible to mess up, so I'm just experimenting to see what tastes best!