How To Bake Your Own Bread Part 2

In my previous post, I introduced you to the ingredients used to make bread at home. You now know what each ingredient does to produce lofty, fragrant, scrumptious loaves of bread in your own kitchen. Now I will discuss the technical aspects of bread baking, from mixing ingredients to baking the loaves.

Once you have assembled your ingredients, remembering to bring everything to at least room temperature, you will begin your bread baking by proofing your yeast in your liquid in a large bowl. Once the yeast bubbles, you know it is active. Add the sugar, fat and start adding the flour one cup at a time. Mix thoroughly between each addition. When your dough becomes less sticky and more elastic, roll it out onto a floured surface. Keep mixing in the flour until you have all the flour the recipe called for mixed in.

Now comes the fun part, kneading. Kneading dough is the process by which the gluten strands are stretched and air is worked into the dough. Starting with your dough in a ball, place the heels of both hands in the center of the the ball of dough. Push away from you as far as the dough will easily stretch. move your hands to the near edge of the dough(closest to you) and fold it over the stretched part. Keep stretching and folding, turning your dough a quarter turn between each fold. This will become rhythmic and is quite a nice workout for your arms. It is also and awesome stress reliever! Keep this up for about 8 minutes. When your dough is finished being kneaded, it will have a smooth slightly shiny appearance, looking a bit like a woman's breast to be totally honest.

When you are finished kneading you will need to place your dough in a warm, moist place to rise. There are many different ways to rise bread and I will outline some of the more common ones. The purpose of rising is to allow the yeast to grow and feed on the sugar in the dough. Doing so will cause the yeast to produce carbon dioxide, which is the gas that makes the bread rise. Dough can become sticky when it rises in a moist place so it is helpful to use some cooking spray to coat the bowl you use to rise your dough. Place the dough in the coated bowl and turn it a few times to coat the dough. Drape a clean tea towel over the bowl to prevent the dough from drying out. I find the easiest way to rise dough is to turn your oven on to the lowest setting for about 10 minutes(before putting your dough in!!) and then turn it off. Place your oven rack in the middle of the oven and a bowl of steaming hot water on the bottom of your oven. Put your bowl of dough on the oven rack and close the oven door. You can also rig up a setting to rise dough  in your sink. Fill the sink about a quarter full of steaming hot water and place a shallow bowl upside down in the water forming a platform for your bowl of dough to sit on. Place several tea towels over the bowl and sink, forming a tent for your dough. Alternately, you can leave your dough in the fridge overnight. The yeast will rise, but much much slower than in the presence of warmth. I've never tried this method, so I can not attest to its efficacy.

You will be advised in your recipe to allow the dough to rise for about 60 minutes. One way to test if the dough is fully risen is to insert your finger in the dough leaving an indent. Leave the dough for 5 minutes or so and check back to see if your indent is still there. If its not, your dough is still rising. Leave it a bit longer. When your dough is risen, you will need to "punch it down". It is what it sounds like: punch the dough in the bowl until it deflates. Roll it out on to a lightly floured surface and knead it lightly until it doesn't shrink anymore. This is how to remove all of the carbon dioxide that has built up in the dough. If you pull a piece of dough off the ball, you will see that it now has a pattern of tiny holes formed by the bubbles of carbon dioxide. This is the texture your baked bread will have.

Next you will shape your dough. Depending on what recipe you are using you will need to either form the dough into a given shape, like a round loaf or braid or you will place the dough into lightly greased loaf pans. You will then need to cover them and return them to the place you use to rise for another 40 minutes. This is the final rise, where the dough takes on the proportions of the final result.

Now we come to the end of your labours. Once your dough has finished it's final rise you can brush the surface with either milk or egg white and apply seasame seeds or poppy seeds if you desire. The milk or egg white coating creates a beautiful brown finish on the loaf. Place your loaves in the oven and then heat it to the required temperature, usually 425 degrees. By placing your loaves in a cool oven, you allow just a few extra minutes for the bread to rise a little bit more before the heat kills off the yeast. Bake your bread for about 30 minutes, or until it sounds hollow when sharply tapped. Be sure to take a moment to savour the fragrance wafting from your kitchen!! When your bread is finished baking remove it from the oven and place it on a cooling rack. After it cools for about 10 minutes, turn out your loaves from the pans. You may need to run the edge of a butter knife around the rim of the pan to loosen it and it should slide right out.

There, that's it!! You have successfully made your own bread. Now sit back and enjoy the fruits of your labours, preferably with some fresh butter or homemade jam!! Never again will squishy store bought bread satisfy you!

How To Make Your Own Bread Part 1

Once upon a time you would be hard pressed to find an average woman who couldn't make bread for her family. It was a required skill for women and it was taught to girls at a young age. I learned to make bread as a young girl also and while I don't do it on a regular basis anymore, it is something that I enjoy and I honestly feel that there is no better fragrance in the world than that of a loaf of bread baking in your own oven. Crack open a window and let the scent waft out, your home will be the envy of the neighbourhood!

Making bread can seem daunting and there are few things that you really need to know about the nature of yeast breads. Once you have this knowledge, bread baking becomes a simple and enjoyable task. All risen breads require a leavening agent. In the case of white bread, yeast is used. Yeast is a single cell fungus that is present in the environment. One method of bread baking requires harnessing wild yeast from the air and growing it. This produces a tangy bread called sourdough. For now we will focus on the use of commercially grown and packaged yeast. Understanding that yeast is a living organism that requires certain conditions to grow dispels some of the mystery of bread baking. Yeast can be a bit temperamental. It likes to be warm and moist and dislikes cold. It won't grow in the cold, which is why all of your ingredients need to be at least room temperature or warmer. As much as yeast dislikes cold, it also dislikes too much heat. When using liquids in a bread recipe it is best to have them heated to a temperature in which you can insert your baby finger and hold it comfortably for ten seconds. This is the ideal temperature in which to grow yeast, not too hot and not too cold. Yeast should be dissolved in the warm liquid that your recipe calls for. This is called "proofing". If the yeast starts to produce bubbles, it is working. Some of the newer brands of yeast say that you don't need to proof, but I feel that it is best to do it anyway to avoid potential disappointment later. Yeast is called "leavening" because it is the agent that causes bread to rise. Yeast activates in a warm moist environment and it feeds on sugars. As the yeast feeds, it produces carbon dioxide (the bubbles you see when proofing) which will cause the dough to rise. This is what gives bread its lift and texture. Yeast can be purchased in individual packets or in bulk. I prefer the packets myself, as it is premeasured and easy to use and store. I also prefer storing yeast in the refrigerator, as this keeps it in a dormant state.

The second most important part of your bread recipe is the flour. Wheat flour makes the best bread because it contains the most gluten. Gluten is the protein found in most grains. It forms stretchy strands that give bread dough its elastic texture and allows it to rise. Bread flour contains more gluten than regular all purpose flour, but all purpose flour works just fine for making bread. Atmospheric conditions can alter exactly how much flour your dough will need. A typical two loaf recipe will call for about 6-61/2 cups of flour but humidity in the air can cause the dough to soak up more flour so don't be afraid to add a bit more if you find your dough too sticky. Baking is a very inexact craft, you needn't be concerned about tweaking recipes to suit your situation.

The next ingredient you need to know about it sugar. As I pointed out before, yeast is a living organism that feeds on sugars. A bread recipe will call for sugar in any of the following forms: white table sugar, honey, molasses or milk. Milk contains lactose, which is also a sugar.  I prefer to use honey as a sugar because it seems to help preserve the bread. In my experience, bread made with white sugar will go stale and grow mold much faster than bread made with honey. Molasses is used to turn white bread into brown bread. It is called for in Boston Brown Bread and some unscrupulous bakeries will use it to make pumpernickel or rye breads darker than they should be(making them appear more wholesome) or they will market molasses bread as "brown bread" intending to fool consumers into believing the loaf is made from whole wheat flour. Always check the ingredients list on commercial brown breads to be sure that the loaf is made of whole wheat and isn't just white bread in disguise.

Your bread recipe will also call for fat in some form. Butter,margarine,  lard or oil may be called for. Each type of fat will produce different results. Oil, for instance, produces a denser, chewier texture than butter. French and Italian breads are made with oil, where your typical everyday white bread uses butter or lard.

Those are the basic ingredients required for every loaf of risen bread. Once you know what they are and what they do, bread baking starts to seem very simple. And it is! My next post will deal with the technical aspects of baking bread.

Natural Homemade Cleaners

One of my favourite topics is cleaning your home with ingredients you most likely already have in your cupboards. I dislike using industrial chemicals on a regular basis in my home. I say industrial chemicals, because all matter is chemical in nature and I prefer to use natural, safe and often edible, chemicals to tackle daily cleaning. One of the most effective and inexpensive cleaners is bicarbonate of soda, also known as baking soda. Other equally useful cleaning ingredients are lemon juice (fresh or bottled) ammonia, white vinegar and salt. Read on for my favourite natural cleaning ideas.

Shoe scuffs and marks on linoleum, wallpaper and scrubbable paint: Make a paste of baking soda and a small amount of water. Rub on mark till the mark is gone. Rinse with clear water.

Clogged drains: Pour one cup of boiling water down blocked drains. Then pour 1/2 cup of baking soda into drain and allow to sit for AT LEAST 30 minutes. Follow with 1/2 cup white vinegar and more hot water. Repeat until drain runs freely.

Smelly carpets or upholstery: Liberally sprinkle baking soda on carpets or upholstered furniture and allow to sit for 30 mins. Vacuum as normal.

Pet stains: Remove as much of the mess as possible. Mix a solution of equal parts water and white vinegar and liberally apply to soiled area. Allow to sit for a few minutes. Soak up solution, allow spot to dry. When dry, liberally apply baking soda and allow to sit for 10 to 15 mins. Vacuum. This can be especially effective for repeat offenders because baking soda and vinegar both naturally neutralize odours, so animals are less likely to re offend in the same spot.

Stains in pots and pans: Scrape off as much burned material as possible. Apply a paste of baking soda and water. Allow to sit for a few minutes and then scrub. Repeat with fresh paste until stain is gone. Alternatively, for burned on foods, apply straight ammonia to the stain and add some hot water. Let sit overnight and by morning the burn will wipe off.

Laundry booster: Add a scoop of baking soda to your wash to boost detergent and remove stains. Add vinegar to your rinse cycle to soften clothes and remove soap residue. Especially useful for washing cloth diapers and reusable menstrual pads. You can use vinegar instead of bleach to remove stains and kill bacteria and it won't leave a residue to irritate sensitive skin.

Fabric Softener substitute: If you prefer to line dry your clothes but miss using fabric softener, try using a cup of vinegar in your rinse cycle. This naturally softens clothes.

Soap scum on shower doors and tub surround: Use straight lemon juice to cut through soap scum and disinfect you shower. Will also polish chrome taps.

Stains on table linens: If you have a stubborn stain on a fabric you don't want to bleach try lemon juice. I highly recommend testing in an inconspicuous place first!!! Apply fresh lemon juice to stain and place dampened area in the direct sunlight. Repeat daily until stain fades. Using a clothesline is probably easiest.

Remove product buildup from your hair: This is my favourite remedy!!! My grandmother got this remedy from her mother. Wash hair as normal. Have ready a mixture of half water and half white vinegar. Pour over hair, being sure to saturate thoroughly. Let stand 5 minutes and then rinse with clear water. Hair will be soft and manageable.

Litter box deodourizer: Mix baking soda in with your fresh litter to neutralize odours.

Polish metals: Soak metal in white vinegar or sponge onto metal and allow to sit for a few minutes. Polish with soft cloth.

Remove limescale and hard water buildup: This remedy works best when used regularly. Apply lemon juice to soiled area. Allow to sit a few minutes and then sprinkle with table salt. Scrub scrub scrub!!! Repeat as required.

As with all cleaning remedies, it is best to test in an inconspicuous place first. The beauty of natural cleaners is that they can do very little damage!!