The Bread Master

It's not me. I really don't feel like a bread master even though I've made like 5 loaves this month! 

Julie, the true bread master, helped me make her 90 Minute Bread recipe and taught me (well, reminded me of) her secret to delicious, soft bread. You rub butter on it when it comes out of the oven!

I want to be a baker like Julie. She could smell the bread and knew it wasn't done yet. She's been baking for years, though. I've got a long way to go.

I think I might try just one more recipe for bread before I move along to the next 4 weeks. Many suggestions have been received regarding the oven situation, and I feel like I need to test it again with adjustments. I also just want to prove I can make a decent loaf all by myself!

This has also really made me want to bake a loaf a week for a year on my next list. But who knows? I may find another bake I love even more before the end of all this!

The bakes continue!

And not much else happened.

My oven continues to plague me:

But I did buy a 25 lb bag of flour!

The bakes have begun!

The first category of the Year of Baking is bread, and the first bread was a French Bread recipe I got from a friend. She promised it was super easy, and during the proofing process I agreed.

The problem came when I introduced my wily oven. I thought I had everything perfectly adjusted when I checked on things and it was 50 degrees too hot! The top was super brown.

I ended up pulling the bread out early, and I'm glad I did. The outside may have been unattractive, but the insides ended up being a great consistency.

Week one is done! I'm considering this a boon to the project - I have nowhere to go but up from here. Hopefully I can wrangle this oven, though. Yikes!

New Year, New Plans

2017 marks the start of two big items off my list:
10. Year of baking

38. Complete a 30-day project each month for 2 years

For my year of bakes, I've selected 13 categories (a baker's dozen!) and 4 items under each category. That's 52 items, so I'll be baking at least once a week for this entire year. The first category up is bread! Expect updates all year long!

My first 30-day project is Attack on Dish Mountain, or making sure the sink is empty before we go to bed. The nice thing about the 30-day projects is they can be pretty simple - it's just about building habits.

Happiest of new years to you all! Let's make 2017 great!