White Bread, For The Zombie Apocolypse

Our second post of the day, we're doubling up lots this past few days.
Check out our other post from earlier today Personality Vs. Dissociative Disorders.

Okay back to the white bread!
All kidding about the Zombie Apocalypse aside, you never know when basic skills can, or will, come in handy.

For many basic skills are subjective. For us basic skills include cooking/baking, sewing fabrics, growing food, tending animals. Two of these things we can do (the food making, and the animal tending).

Never ask us to tend a garden, by the way, it's pretty universal among us all that everything green we touch tends to take a drastic and sudden trip to it's death.

We've killed bamboo and ivies on more than one occasion, and those are hearty plants.

Today we're talking about bread, white bread to be exact. Making bread is a great skill, and an important staple  in the event of the Zombie Apocalypse!

First Assemble the Ingredients:
THE INGREDIENTS:
BASIC WHITE BREAD
Yeast - 1 Tbsp
Water - 300 ml
Sugar - 1 Tbsp
Flour - 500 g
Salt - 5 ml
Butter, soft 30 g 
Milk (as required)

Things You Should Know About Bread Ingredients -

Yeast:
Yeast is a single celled living micro-organism. It`s a fungi.
We're not going to write too much about it. What you need to know is that there are three kinds of yeast, the most common for home use is 'active dry', and then there is 'instant' and 'fresh' (if you want to know more you can find information, including on the proper way to store it, here: http://allrecipes.com/howto/yeast-the-basics/) 

Our yeast getting happy!

Dry yeast lives in a sleeping, or hibernation, stage and can be awakened by sprinkling it on warm (about 90 °F - 33 °C) water with a bit of sugar (whatever the recipe you're using calls for). Yeast LOVES sugar, it makes it "excited" and release gases.
If you use water that is too hot you will kill the yeast.

Flour:
Flour makes up the main ingredient in bread. (duh, right?)
We recommend you weigh flour, instead of measure it in cups. Why?
All wheat/flour is not created equal, to put it simply the moisture content of flour is not consistent (same for any grain, actually) and if the year it was harvested was a wetter year, the moisture content may be higher, meaning one cup of flour with a high moisture content will affect how much you need in a recipe, and how much moisture ultimately ends up in the mix. (Baking is a science, small amounts of excess moisture can and will change the dough.)
There are different kinds of flour, and they are rated on protein content. The protein content affects the strength and texture of the bread. For example cake flour, which is the lowest rated in protein percentage (very similar to pastry flour), is often used for lighter pastries, such as pastries, pies, and cookies, cakes. (to learn more about flour basics, including storage suggestions, go here: http://www.joyofbaking.com/flour.html)

Kneading and Gluten:
The process of kneading bread is the process of (gently) stretching dough and is what developes the gluten. Gluten, put simply, is what enables the bread to proof (rise) and...well...be puffy and look like bread. It is a very important process in the ability for your bread to rise.

That's us, kneading bread today

Alright then!
What should you do with these ingredients?
Putting It All Together -
INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Dissolve (1Tbsp) sugar in (300ml) warm water. Sprinkle (1Tbsp) yeast on the sugar and water mix.
2. In a separate bowl combine (500g) flour and (5ml) salt.
3. Combine dry ingredients with (30g) butter.
4. Add yeast/water mixture to flour mixture.
5. Knead until smooth and elastic (and forms gluten "window"*) - we started by using a mixer, and then took it to the counter.
6. Let rest on counter top until doubles in size (proof/rise)
7. Punch down and knead gently a second time.
8. Form into loaf and place in pan and proof until doubles in size.
9. Brush with milk and bake 35-40 minutes at 400 °F (210 °C) in a conventional oven <- that's the ones most people in North America have (adjust temperature lower for convection oven)

That's all that's left of our loaf...*

When the bread comes out of the oven we suggest you brush the outside with butter to make it soft and supple.

Let rest as long as you can.


EAT!!!


Alternative:
MAKE CARAMEL ROLLS!

We had some great pics, but ...*

• Same process above except stop after Step 8 and roll the dough into a square.
• Coat top with plenty of softened butter (about a quarter cup), sprinkle on some brown sugar (at least half a cup, or as much as you want)
• Roll the edges up tight.
• Slice the roll into equal pieces (you can make them big or small)
• Place in a pan and let rise in a warm place for about 40 minutes.
• Bake!

There are of course recipe specifically for caramel rolls, but since you're already making bread...why not make something sweet!


If you have any questions feel free to post them in the comments section so it can benefit everyone who lands on this page:)

*We had more pictures, but our smart phone took a dumb dump and the last half of our pictures turned into corrupted files.

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*Gluten "window"

the photo of ours didn't stick in the camera, so this is a photo we found, basically what a gluten "window" looks like.

P.S. we were the best bread baker in our baking class in culinary school, we have many years of bread baking experience, so hopefully we were able to pass on some of what we know. (thankfully good internet sources can be used to back up what we know)

They'll want a side of bread...now you can supply it!

Here are some pictures of a baking project we did with a culinary school partner.

Multigrain Bread #1

Multigrain Bread #2

Multigrain Bread #3

White Bread #1

White Bread #2

Challah Bread (#2)

Challah Bread (our favourite bread)
halfway through baking process. (#1)

Challah Bread (#3)

Cheese Twists

Final Products:

House made crackers, white bread, multigrain bread, foccacia, Challah bread.