Baking Mode

I love to bake. It's fun to put something scrumptious together with your own hands, place it in the oven and have it come out smelling up the entire house with it's delicious scent. What I don't love doing is cleaning up after these episodes. So I generally don't bake. Lately, however, I've been starting again. I've experimented with cobbler, crumbles, home made applesauce, and bread.

Yesterday was bread day. I had been meaning to get out and buy some more bread for our family but then I realized I have all the ingredients and the necessary time to put them together. So, with my littlest son down to nap time and the elder downstairs playing construction worker, I started making Oatmeal bread. Unfortunately, several times in my recipe I was told to set what I had done aside in a warm area to rise/foam/... Well, in my house there are no warm areas right now. We are using lots of sweaters.

So my ingenious idea was to turn the oven on to warm. But the oven did more than warm my rising yeast...it almost cooked it! So my bread rose very slowly. After the first rising, I only had time for one more if I even wanted it in the oven before I left to teach my dance class. So I skipped the second rising and put my dough right in the pans to rise. About a half hour later they were still slightly deformed but I popped them in the oven anyway. Then I was off to my dance class and when I returned they were neatly on the cooling rack and out of their pans. Thank you love (husband Pocho helped)!

I would like to make this a regular event! I used to bake a lot as a kid/younger woman. I think it's time to get back to that. Smells like spinach pie! Or maybe it's time to bust out the famous butterscotch cookie recipe from who ma? Aunt Betty?

Oh, and side note before I leave this post...the place I was accustomed to buying my bread is no longer. I drove by today and all the bread racks were out on the sidewalk, the sign was down, and I don't know what they're doing with the place. We'll see!