Alors, bread!

Simple, eh? I've made bread before, years ago, but that was before I got a Kitchenaid. Then, I needed a lot of kneading space and time and while the bread was good, it wasn't fall-in-love good. And the kitchen ended up coated in flour.

This time round, things were different.

I'm using Alton Brown's Basic Bread recipe. You really do need a scale for this recipe, but as you'll note, I winged it with conversion of bread flour into cups. (In future, I won't do this.) All of the Good Eats eps are available on YouTube, and I'd suggest watching the ep while making the bread because he explains the science of what he's doing. Such as "why mix together a yeast slurry the night before?"

So, into a suitable container: first portion flour, honey, first portion rapid yeast, and bottled/filtered water. Whisk quickly, then leave in the fridge overnight.

Wake up the next morning, put rest of flour, rest of yeast, and salt into the Almighty Kitchenaid! Attach piratey bread hook, arrr. Tip the yeast slurry into the mixer, and turn the gears onto "2". Why 2? Because Kitchenaid really can't handle anything faster while kneading bread, but no one tells you that until your machine starts making funny noises. And if you've measured the flour incorrectly, your dough's going to be REALLY thick and bad, bad things might happen.

Once the dough's picked up all the flour in the bowl and blended in well, tip up the mixer's head and leave the dough at the bottom of the bowl to rest for 20 minutes, covering the bowl with a teatowel. It'll be a little puffier, at which point lower the hook, bwa ha ha! Knead mercilessly for 5-10 minutes.

Lightly grease a container and chuck the doughball in; put this in your oven with a roasting pan full of boiling water. Don't turn the oven on or anything, this is just to keep the steam in an enclosed place with the rising dough. Leave it alone for 2 hours.

I'll update with kneading photos sometime, maybe. It's probably better to leave it to the Good Eats episode. Besides, the really weird and important part was the slurry. (That, and not breaking your mixer.)

But here is the result! It's Franken bread! I didn't shape the loaf as well as I might have, so there's a weird little bulge going on at the bottom of the bread, but that didn't affect the flavour. Which was delicious!

All together, good project. Long project, and passively time-consuming -- you don't really need to do much more work than about 30 minutes, but you need to be present. But this is a pretty good thing to do on a Saturday morning, and you'll have fresh (unpreserved, so short shelflife) bread for the weekend. And when you add up all the ingredients, it's cheaper than buying nice bread from a local bakery. So really, it's all about working the time into your schedule.

But let me tell you: this fresh bread with honey, or jam, or nutella or peanut butter? Seriously satisfying.