smc cooks amish sandwich bread

this is possibly the easiest bread you will ever make. a woman in my ward was talking about it and was nice enough to send the recipe to me. i have plenty of experience making bread-i love to do it, but i REALLY like this recipe. slightly sweet, but you could still make a sandwich out of this easy to slice bread.

amish sandwich bread

2 cups warm water
3/4 cups sugar
2 tbs(4 envelopes)yeast
1/4 cup oil
6 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt(the original recipe doesnt call for it and its great without it, but i am going to try it with a little salt to see what it does. i think it will even be better.)

dissolve the sugar in the warm water. sprinkle the yeast on top, proof for 5 minutes.
(bread making 101: yeast loves sugar-it eats it up! if the yeast does not get all bubbly and yeasty smelling, then its a dud. start with new yeast. you probably know that, but i am just saying.)
stir in the oil.
if you are going to add salt, do it here.
add the flour a cup at a time. you can do this by hand or with a stand mixer. once the dough starts to pull together and form a ball, turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead a few times.
cover and let rise in an oiled bowl for about an hour.
punch down(or use alton browns "degassing" method from dr strangeloaf), knead a few more times and split the dough in half. form loaves(that clip shows you how to do that too.)and place in greased loaf pans. cover and allow to rise for about an hour. bake at 350 for 20-30 min.
this bread never stays around long enough to go stale, so have butter and honey ready for your family to gobble it up

smc cooks for Christmas

i have 2 sets of friends that i usually dont get a chance to get together with until after Christmas. this works out well for me because it gives me more time to finish putting together gifts. gives me something to do on a lazy Christmas day when i dont feel like picking up all the tattered gift wrap and crushed bows left about the living room.amongst these friends, we usually give little token gifts, but the thing we most look forward to is the exchange of the goodies. we all have our specialties, but besides my loved-by-all biscotti, i made a few new things that everyone went crazy over. i made some old fashioned chocolate syrup by alton brown and put it in some cool looking vintage jars. i had stopped making chocolate truffles years ago, but when i saw this interesting recipe by the pioneer woman, i just had to try it and i am so glad i did. everyone loved them! the dark and milk chocolates are balanced just right and the few grains of sea salt add an amazing layer of flavor.
i did a few more things, but my favorite was that i "brewed" my own vanilla. got a couple of vanilla beans and a jug of vodka and i was good to go. everyone has been impressed with their little bottles of the amber liquid with a vanilla bean soaking inside. kind of fun shopping for vodka in a small, mostly lds town.