Manna from Heaven

Everyone is always asking me for bread recipes. I think this is for a few reasons: 1) People think baking bread is scary, and 2) No one has baked bread in so long there is no one to learn from. My mom made all our bread when I was very little but she stopped as I grew older but not before she taught me how to knead and how to appreciate a warm loaf of freshly bake bread. I just think there is nothing like it.
My favorite everyday, sandwich and toast bread recipe I got from Peter Reinhart. It is absolutely wonderful. The name says it all.

Multigrain Bread Extraordinaire
Make a soaker the night before of:
3 T cornmeal, millet, quinoa or amaranth
3 T oats, buckwheat or triticale flakes
2 T wheat bran
1/4 cup water
Stir together:
3 cups bread flour
3 T brown sugar
1.5 t salt
1 T yeast
3 T cooked brown rice
1.5 T honey
the soaker
1/2 cup buttermilk
3/4 cup water
Knead 10 min. You may have to add flour or water for consistency. I always end up with a sticky dough and have to add flour. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and ferment at room temperature for 90 minutes. Remove dough and put into oiled loaf pan. Spray with oil and cover with plastic. Leave again for 90 minutes. Remove plastic and bake for 40 minutes at 350 degrees.


My favorite French bread recipe came with my pizza stone. You dissolve 1 packet yeast in 1 cup warm water and dissolve 1 T. salt in 2 cups warm water. Pour all this into 6 cups bread flour and add enough flour to make a pliable dough. Knead 15 min. Let rise until doubled. Punch down and divide into two loaves. Spread cornmeal on a pizza peel. Leave dough to rise on the peel, again until doubled. Put pizza stone in a hot oven (500+) for 15 min. Reduce temp to 400 and cover stone with cornmeal. Slide loaves onto stone and bake for 25 min. or until hollow sounding when tapped. Gorgeous. If you take this to a dinner party wait to bake it until you get there. You will have everyone drooling.