Homemade Bread

Making bread with my friend Mary. If I look taller than usual it's because I'm standing on a stool. Kneading is easier when you are well above the dough. Thank you Cheryl for taking the picture!

I was so happy to see my friend Mary already at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral when I arrived extra early this morning set to make homemade French bread for the Wednesday Community Meal.

Making homemade bread is so much easier when you have someone to help you scoop and add flour as you get your hands sticky and gooey from mixing and kneading the dough.

Mary and I went through 50 pounds of flour today to make 45 loaves of bread and the guests really loved it. I mean who doesn't like warm homemade bread?

It is a lot of work though, and at one point today after shaping my umpteenth loaf, I asked my friends to tell me "no" the next time I said I was going to make bread from scratch for the meal.

But now that the bread has been baked and served, I take my impulsive statement back. Homemade bread is such a special treat for our guests that I truly want to make it again for them, just maybe not next week.

Oh, and I definitely will let Mary know when that will be because I don't even want to think of taking on the task without her help. She is a wonderful teammate.

We served 293 meals today.

Today's meal of spaghetti and meatballs and a thick slice of warm bread.

If you want to make a single batch of French bread, here is the recipe:


French Bread
(makes 4 loaves)
2 packages yeast
2/3 cup tepid water
1/2 teaspoon sugar
7 cups bread flour (additional may be needed)
2 tablespoons rye or whole wheat flour
4 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 cups cold water
(cornmeal for sprinkling on sheet pan or parchment paper)

Combine yeast, sugar and tepid water. Let set for 5 minutes.

Combine the remaining ingredients then add yeast mixture. Knead.

Let rise 40 to 60 minutes in a clean, dry bowl. Then deflate and punch into a 14-inch rectangle and fold into thirds.

Return dough to bowl and let rise 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Make loaves and let rise another  1 1/2 hours.

Place loaves on baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal or lined with parchment paper, slash and place in a preheated 450 degree oven tossed with 1/4 cup of water. Bake 20 minutes and then bake an additional 10 minutes at 400 degrees.

Half-Pound Burgers On Homemade Buns

We served the burgers open faced with the condiments on the side so that guest could assemble them as they desired. We also served a side of chips or roasted potatoes.

I don't think I've seen bigger or better burgers than the ones we served today at the Wednesday Community Meal - a half-pound burger on a homemade bun and topped with cheese, pickles, onion and tomato.

It was so much fun treating our guests today and boy were we busy. We served 354 meals.

Pat, one of our servers said there were lots of happy guests in the dining room. "They just see the burger on the plate and they smile," she said.

When one of the guests was leaving I said "I hope you enjoyed it and I hope you come back."

"Oh man," he said,  "That was a great burger and the bun took it to the next level."

Besides enhancing the meal, the homemade buns helped us utilize the flour that we get from The Oregon Food Bank. Making the buns instead of buying them saved us lots of money.

I began making the buns just after 8 a.m. this morning using my favorite French bread recipe and multiplying it by 24. By 10:30 a.m. we were pulling trays of just-baked buns out of the oven.

Rising dough.

Fresh out of the oven hamburger buns.

There were so many volunteers who were needed to help pull the meal together in the kitchen. Thank you Cheryl, Cindy, Bill, Jay, Steve, Dave, Mary, Leah, Martha, Anne, Kate, Linda, Jeff, Gwen, Ann and Linda B. - you are wonderful!

Super volunteer Anne even smiled as she plated the burgers.

The kitchen was hopping today - we served 354 meals.

Jeff (left) cooked and assembled all the burgers, Gwen managed the ovens added cheese to the burgers and Linda (in back) sliced all the buns.

Here is  the French Bread recipe that I love:

French Bread
(makes 4 loaves)
2 packages yeast
2/3 cup tepid water
1/2 teaspoon sugar
7 cups bread flour (additional may be needed)
2 tablespoons rye or whole wheat flour
4 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 cups cold water
(cornmeal for sprinkling on sheet pan or parchment paper)

Combine yeast, sugar and tepid water. Let set for 5 minutes.
Combine the remaining ingredients then add yeast mixture. Knead.

Let rise 40 to 60 minutes in a clean, dry bowl. Then deflate and punch into a 14-inch rectangle and fold into thirds.

Return dough to bowl and let rise 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Make loaves and let rise another  1 1/2 hours.

Place loaves on baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal or lined with parchment paper, slash and place in a preheated 450 degree oven tossed with 1/4 cup of water. Bake 20 minutes and then bake an additional 10 minutes at 400 degrees.

French Bread

I have a wonderful recipe for French bread that I've been making for more than 20 years.

I don't even remember how or from whom I got the recipe. At some point, I did have the smarts to print it onto a sheet of paper.

There are also side notes for multiplying the recipe by five since I like to make it for the Wednesday Community Meal. For that, I usually make 10 batches of the recipe times five and still always run out because it's a great recipe and everyone loves homemade bread.

My bread recipe.

 French Bread
(makes 4 loaves)
2 packages yeast
2/3 cup tepid water
1/2 teaspoon sugar
7 cups bread flour (additional may be needed)
2 tablespoons rye or whole wheat flour
4 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 cups cold water
(cornmeal for sprinkling on sheet pan or parchment paper)

Combine yeast, sugar and tepid water. Let set for 5 minutes.

After 5 minutes the yeast foams and proves that it's alive.

Combine the remaining ingredients then add yeast mixture. Knead.

Let rise 40 to 60 minutes in a clean, dry bowl. Then deflate and punch into a 14-inch rectangle and fold into thirds.

Return dough to bowl and let rise 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Make loaves and let rise another  1 1/2 hours.

Place loaves on baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal or lined with parchment paper, slash and place in a preheated 450 degree oven tossed with 1/4 cup of water. Bake 20 minutes and then bake an additional 10 minutes at 400 degrees.

Slashing the loaves just before baking.

Warm bread!