Food for thought: White Bread

Happy Thursday Everyone!

I hope you’re enjoying your week as we approach the weekend. And we are almost done with August and seems the whole world is still not back to normal. It looks like that we are in for the long haul with this pandemic. Let’s continue to take extra precautions on what we do and stay safe as always. Wearing face masks and social distancing are the new normal now and honestly face masks are becoming a fashion already I must say. I am sure you have noticed that there are cool and beautiful designed face masks available in the stores or online and people are wearing them everywhere…

White Bread is one of my family’s favorite. My children love them for their grilled cheese, peanut butter and jelly or simply eat them with pat of butter. I bake our bread and we barely buy from the grocery store now. So, we are very lucky to be able to eat home made and fresh bread everyday. It is very easy to make once you have the grasp of basic baking. Most recipes for bread are very much the same. Just a small difference on ingredients maybe but for preparation, very similar most of the time.

Again, I always try different recipes first maybe 4-6 recipes and learn from them. Then I come up a final recipe to my likeness taste wise and have my children judge if they love it. If they say “YES” then I get them published. I tried to make all my recipes more homemade rather than a bit commercialized. For example adding milk instead of just water or adding vanilla extract to make it tastier and smell yummy.

Anyways, here’s the recipe for the White Bread. The recipe is good for two loaves of bread but you can always do half only. Otherwise, you can always freeze the other loaf for the following week or two. I normally bake two and keep them both in the fridge and that would last for my family for about two weeks. You can toast or simply warm it on the microwave for about 10-15 seconds and serve it with butter. Bread stays fresh and delicious! Store the bread in a plastic container to keep it fresh. Enjoy!

Ingredients: 2 loaves of bread

• 9 cups of all purpose flour
• 5 tsp of instant yeast
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract (optional)
• 3 tbsp butter
• 1 2/3 cup warm milk
• 1 3/4 cup warm water
• 2 tbsp melted butter to brush dough

Preparation: 2 hours 15 min

• Combine flour, instant yeast, sugar and salt
• Add water, milk, butter, vanilla and mix well
• On a floured surface, knead about 10 min and shape into a ball
• Put the dough onto a greased bowl and cover with saran wrap
• Let it rise for about an hour or until double
• Punch the dough a few times until no more air pockets
• Divide into two parts
• Flatten each dough into a rectangle, roll up and pinch each end
• Put into a greased loaf pan and cover loosely with saran wrap
• Set them to rise for about 30 min or until double
• Brush with butter
• Preheat oven to 400 F and bake for about 25 min
• Remove from pan and let it cool

Tips:

• Water must be around 110 F only not more
• Make sure bread is at room temperature or just slightly warm before slicing

Enjoy!!!