Christmas Eve was super busy for me! Got a new China Cabinet (which meant taking apart my kitchen and putting it back together), baked Banana Bread, and starting at around 9pm I baked some French Bread!
I think this was the most successful bread making attempt I’ve ever had! Though, there is still much more to learn!!
I liked how this recipe let me just put everything in a bowl and start mixing! Doesn’t all that foaming look neat!! =)
After mixing and kneading for … like, ever … we get the picture below! The bowl had already been cleaned and oiled at this point the dough then just plopped in there to rise.
I let it rise for a full two hours. I moved it from the kitchen to the living room about half way since the kitchen was quite cool!
After two hours, I got the above image! Then I separated it into two different loaves, molded them a bit, and set them to rise for about 30 minutes!
I had a hard time getting the slashes in the tops to stay and I did read that you probably need to let it rise more if the slashes aren’t staying … but, I think my knives are just a bit dull!
This was the first time I remembered to actually coat the tops of my bread with something and wow does that make a huge difference!
After the allotted time in the oven, I got beautiful looking french bread!! At this point it was nearing 1am in the morning … Christmas morning … so I stopped here for the night!
The next day I wrapped them up for travel! Their destination? My Aunt’s house for Christmas dinner!
I am super proud of these but next time will do some research on how to flavor bread … it’s great if you put something on it but doesn’t taste like anything by itself …
Managed to get a nice crumb picture as my Uncle cut it open!
Success in my opinion!! =)
Penny and Lucy 