White Bread

I like most types of bread. Be it white smushable stuff, or a crusty Italian, or a wheat chocked full of healthy grains and nuts.

HH does not. He likes plain white bread. Period. The softer, the better. My home made bread works great for him as long as I do not put anything else in it. Just good soft white bread. He has told me that this bread is so good, that he even craves pizza made with it! (I love pizza, he does not, so for him to request pizza for dinner is a miracle) .

Since I am attempting to make more of our day to day products homemade, I have been experimenting with different bread recipes. My favorite by far came from here.

I modified it a little bit. I do not buy different types of flour. I am a bit too cheap and lazy to do that. To me it is much easier just to buy good ol' AP flour and be done with it.  AP flour does not contain the necessary proteins that bread flour does that gives it a more spring when baked (For better slicing, it still tastes great, just falls a part a bit too much). To fix this I substitute about a half cup of vital wheat gluten in for the flour. I keep it around for making my own meat substitutes, no uni-taskers in my kitchen.

It works great!!! And it adds in some good healthy protein.

For those of you out there saying "I thought gluten was bad for you?" No. Its not, at all. Only people suffering from celiac disease need to avoid gluten. They have a gluten intolerance. If you do not suffer from celiac disease gluten is just fine.  Do research on proper nutrition and you will see how many of the fad diets are just ridiculous. (The next crazy one I bet they tell us to cut out protein).

Anyway... enough of my ranting about crazy diets.....

The ingredients:
1/2 cup warm water
1 1/2 Tablespoon yeast
1 Tablespoon sugar
1 cup hot water
1/3 cup oil
1/6 cup sugar
2 teaspoons salt
1 1/4 cup cold water
3 cups flour
3-4 cups flour

Directions:

In a small bowl mix 1/2 c warm water, yeast, and 1 T sugar. Let it sit 5 minutes.

In a mixer (or a large bowl if you do not have a mixer) mix the hot water, oil, sugar, and salt. Stir until dissolved.

Add cold water to the mixer, then add yeast mixture. (Add the cold water so the hot does not burn the yeast).

Add in 3 c flour (Or 2 1/2 c flour and 1/2 c vital wheat gluten) and let it rise 30 minutes.

Add in rest of flour and mix. Add enough flour to make a dough that is not sticky. This last time I had to add a considerable amount more flour then I usually do, so just add enough until it looks right. Knead until smooth. I used the mixer, but finished it off by hand.

Let rise 30 minutes.

Form into 2 loaves. Oil loaf pans, then put the loaves in. Let rise 1 hour, or until doubled in size in warm area covered by a damp tea towel.

Bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes, until golden brown.

The directions to me look more intimidating then the recipe actually is. It is pretty easy, and there is plenty of time in between to do little projects. Such as make tortillas!