How to Make Homemade Bread

When I was growing up, my friends loved sleeping over at my house because they knew that every Saturday morning was scone morning.  My mom made homemade bread  and she would rob bread dough and make scones for breakfast.  I would eat my scones smothered in homemade strawberry jam sitting next to my rancher dad who had already put in a full-day’s work.  He would wake us up on Saturday’s with shouts of “you’re burning daylight!” on his way out to feed the cows at 5 a.m.  My friends endured the early morning wakeup call for the smell of baking bread and strawberry jam smothered scones.

The smell of bread baking seemed to float from my house to my Grammy’s, which was only three miles away.  You see, we are a family of bread makers.  My mom tells stories of eating homemade bread fresh from the oven at her grandma’s house.  These tastes tie generations together.

Familysearch.org has an amazing feature on it where you can add memories and recipes to your family tree to be documented for future generations.  I’m all in with this type of thing and will be going through my family recipes, documenting them on Familysearch.org and sharing them with you, because good friends trade recipes.

Homemade Bread Recipe.

This bread is best eaten as toast or just as a slice of bread with jam.  It is a little too moist to use for sandwich bread. This makes 2-3 loaves of bread.  I usually double the recipe and freeze the loaves I don’t use for later.

A lot of people get really nervous about using yeast.  Don’t be nervous.  The key is to use hot water (It needs to be pretty hot, not burn yourself hot, but just a little bit cooler than that). You will know that it is working because it will get bigger and bubble.  If it doesn’t work try again and use a little cooler or hotter water.

Recipe for Making Homemade Bread

Step 1:Mix yeast, warm water and sugar together.  Let rest for 5-10 minutes while you mix the rest.

Step 2:  Melt butter and then mix with a hand mixer the butter, sugar, canned milk, water and salt.

Step 3:  Now add your yeast to the bowl and mix with hand mixer.  (It should be bigger and have foam on top)

Step 4:  Mix in flour.  I usually use a hand mixer and put in 4-5 C and keep adding flour until it becomes hard to mix and then I mix with a wooden spoon and my hands adding flour as I go until the dough is no longer sticky.  If you are using a standing mixer, keep adding flour until it pulls away from the edges.

Step 5:  Cover and let rise for 1 hour or until double in size.

Step 6:  Take out 1/3 of the dough and kneed for 2-3 minutes, forming into a loaf.

Step 7:  Place in creased bread pan and let rise for 1 hour.

Step 8:  Bake at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes.

Step 9:  For butter-top bread: After you take it out of the oven, let rest for 5 minutes, then spread a thin layer of butter on the top.

3 T Yeast

1 C warm water

1 T sugar

1/2 C sugar

1/2 C butter

1 C canned milk

2 1/2 C water

2 T salt

7-9 C flour