Bread Making

I am definitely not a believer of a no carb diet.  I love bread!  I actually enjoy making it just as much as I enjoy eating it.  A slice of toast with jam is the perfect way to start the day, in my opinion.  The bread recipes I use change with the seasons but the one that I always come back to is WHO Bread.  I make it in the bread machine, set the timer overnight and we wake up to the smell of delicious homemade bread.

WHO Bread

1 1/4 cup water
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons butter
1 tsp salt
3 cups of flour (select your own flour, I use wholemeal but rye is delicious, too)
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast

It is such a wonderful way to start the day and it only takes a few minutes out of the night time routine.  In fact, it is part of the routine.  Occasionally, I will knead the bread by hand and that takes a minute or two spread out over a few hours but this recipe is perfect for the machine.  I guess that is the beauty of having a bread machine.  When I don't have the energy or the time, I have the choice to simply pop the ingredients into the machine.

Whenever I make bread I think of my grandmothers and those who came before me.  I have many of my grandmothers recipes in a special folder and I think of them cooking and kneading and making bread for my parents and for me as a child and then I bring myself to the present and realise that I am doing the same for my family.  Crazy as it sounds, I get a lot of satisfaction from that.  It stretches from my past but it makes me fully aware of the present at the same time.  It is comforting, rhythmic and focused.