Baking Bread

I have a major fail in baking that I occasionally attempt. Making bread from scratch. Today a blogger that I follow "Knead to Cook" gave me a link to the perfect loaf of french bread.

Using the bread hook to knead the dough :)

It's pretty embarrassing... I mean, c'mon. Flour, Water, Yeast, Salt. 4 ingredients. How hard can this be? For some reason, I have been over thinking this whole bread thing.

But in a way, it's kind of a blessing in disguise. I truly am born a carb addict. And if I knew how to bake bread, I'd have been in big trouble at a much earlier age.

It's RISING!! This is a good sign :)

In college I lived on the East side of town and to get to the campus I had to drive down the road that housed a commercial bakery and a Mom and Pop bakery. I swear to God they pumped out the scent of that wonderful yeasty smelling bread as it baked.

I do believe I succeeded for the first time ever... well, sort of. I managed the measuring, I managed the mixing and the kneading. I even succeeded in raising the dough like Lazarus!! When it came time to forming and then moving the dough to the baking stone... well, lets just say it reshaped into a form that looked a little like a snake that swallowed something. LOL.

In the end, it was cut and had that beautiful crispy crust, butter was spread on it,the inside was wonderfully soft and the taste was perfect! Maybe I should say I formed the loaves like that on purpose????

To get the recipe, copy and past this link. Because I haven't quite figured out how to add a link to my blog so that you can just click on it. ;)
steamykitchen.com/75-baking-the-perfect-loaf-of-french-bread.html