SURPRISE VICTORY!

I am now a successful bread maker.

Yesterday I attempted to make a little loaf of bread for the first time EVER.  I was scared.

But I was armed with ambition and a page full of useful bread-making tips!  The cookbook I use is kick-ass.  Given to me by my health-conscious (to put it mildly) mother.  It's called Good Food Great Medicine and it supposedly will keep you from getting heart disease, something my mom thinks will happen to her entire family.  Moving on!

Side note:  Henry and I went hiking the other day.  We would stop to look at things along the way and when he was done he would cry out, "moving on!" with an upward inflection at the end and I would reply, "moving on!" with an emphatic emphasis down.  It was hysterical.  to me.

The bread-making attempt started out fine.  Warm water, yeast, a little flour.  What could go wrong with that?  Nothing, except the fact that I just really didn't have enough time to be making bread.  I needed each rise to take only an hour, no more.  And really, if I was going to finish my loaf before rehearsal, it needed to take less time than that. 

Long story short, the first rise took an hour-and-a-half and even then, I was cheating.  By the time I set it aside for the second rise, I had to leave.  "Oh well, " I thought resignedly.  "At least it was a baby loaf, so I didn't waste too many ingredients."  I was prepared to leave it to die.

However, fast-forward three-ish hours ... I returned home to find a delightful doubling of my dough.  I called my wonderful mother to ask if I could still use it even though it had been sitting so long and she said, in short, "why not?"  Why not indeed.  So, I pulled the sticky ball of dough out and began kneading.

Soon I looked like this.

I spent way too long trying to knead my overly sticky dough and cackling hysterically at my attempts to dust the countertop with flour by holding a spoon with my elbows before giving myself permission to add more flour; proportions be damned! (sheisse, that was a long sentence!)

Ha.  Anyway.  I put it aside for the final rise and surprisingly enough, IT ROSE!

And then I put it in the oven and IT BAKED!

AND IT TASTES GREAT AND LOOKS PRETTY!!!

SURPRISE VICTORY!

next up:  regular-sized loaves ...

P.S.  Don't forget to read and comment on the previous post.  I'm incredibly interested in your thoughts on bravery.  Although bread and baking thoughts are fun too!