"homemade bread" news and stories

Happy Homemade Bread Day!

It's amazing what a base of flour and water is capable of. Though breads often take a back seat, as accompaniments to main courses, cheeses or more, today we celebrate bread worthy of standing on its own, the ultimate mobile comfort food -- not to over-toot the French, but gloriously buttery croissants and crunchy, subtly salty baguettes spring to mind.

So get baking! For holiday inspiration, with the addition of pumpkin and spices, bread becomes the complex Pumpkin Spice Bread or a moist Pumpkin Cheese Bread with cream cheese, or can even serve as a worthy Thanksgiving side dish, in our Savory Bread Pudding recipe.

What are your most cherished baked breads? Share your favorites in the comments!

Become a member of the Slashfood Flickr pool to get a shot at having your photos featured in Feast Your Eyes.

I'm quite happy to have some Scottish ancestry. It's led me to the dry and delicious world of scones, the simplicity of shortbread, the warm and satisfying bite of Scotch, and the utter tastiness of haggis. Now, it's led me to warm and tasty baps.

Scottish baps are simply bread rolls made with yeast. They must be kneaded and allowed to rise a few times before being flattened, left to raise again, and then pinched to keep them from rounding out while baking. They only need to be baked for 20-30 minutes, and they're the perfect sort of bread for beginner bakers. The recipe is incredibly easy, it familiarizes you with kneading and rising, and it is hard to mess up. The flavor of a bap is simple, yet rewarding. It tastes much like a freshly made biscuit while having the texture of a well-worked piece of bread. The outside is wonderfully crisp while the inside is soft, airy, and just waiting for a slab of butter.

There's really no limit to the foods that can be slid inside a bap, and Wise Geek notes that regional favorites include bacon batties (bacon, butter, and a brown sauce), baps served alongside Lincolnshire sausages, and fritter rolls that pile potato fritters inside.

Bap recipe after the jump.

When I was a kid, I loved reading novels by Enid Blyton, E. Nesbit and Noel Streatfeild. They all wrote British young adult fiction set in the forties and fifties. I read these books for the stories, but more than that, I loved them for the descriptions of the food. I gobbled up the detailed listings of of cakes, boiled vegetables and egg cups with toast soldiers. This image of this soft boiled egg and homemade toast soldier make me think of all those stories and now all I want to do is settle down to a breakfast of eggs and toast, with a nice cup of tea.

Source

Like most of the foodie world, I was totally entranced by the No-Knead Bread recipe that got posted in the New York Times Dining and Wine section last fall (although I didn't get around to making it until January). I baked the bread in a variety of pots, with different types and combinations of flours and played around with the length of the fermenting time. It was the first time in my life I felt totally comfortable baking bread.

But then the weather started getting nice and I promptly forgot about this terrific recipe. However, thanks to Jaden (and her Steamy Kitchen) I am once again reminded about the No-Knead Bread. She posted a little photo essay of her son making the dough all by himself and it is totally sweet and endearing. And the bread comes out golden, with that perfectly browned crust.

White bread is often held up as a villain, a food that should be avoided at all costs, due to the fact that it lacks whole grains and because its name is nearly synonymous with overly processed, pre-sliced loaves. But many artisan breads are made with white flours and are still perfectly acceptable to eat, so the real villain here is the preservatives and other additives used in many white breads. Fortunately, all of them can be avoided by simply making your own.

White bread makes great sandwiches and even better toast. This loaf will remind you of the best sandwich bread you had from your childhood - only better. It has a very even crumb, or texture, and a light, buttery flavor.