More bread...

I thought of all of you while I was shaping my bread dough this morning. I have gone through fits and spurts of making my own and then buying from the store. My preference would be to always have homemade bread. Sometimes my schedule gets so busy, and I can't. The recipe I used today is also from the More With Less Cookbook that I mentioned earlier in the week. This is the basic white bread recipe, but I do throw in whole wheat flour. I used to be more of a purist, but I was having trouble getting a good rise out of my whole wheat bread. So, I am experimenting. The last time I made this recipe I got very good sandwich bread. It was soft but not mushy, and it did not get hard over time in the pantry. It looks delicious. I will freeze three of the loaves and leave one out for tomorrow's lunch.




The rest of my day was spent at gym and swim with the children. We have been part of this program for about five years now. The children have a 45 minute gym class and a half hour swim class. My son is taking the life guarding class.

Supper is finished, and the kitchen clean up thank to the hard work of the children and I. Actually, it wasn't that hard. We had pasta bake, French bread and a salad. They were all very simple to make. We had some of that French bread that I made on Monday. It was very tasty. Tomorrow I think we will be baking peanut butter cookies. Brianna has had a passion for baking recently, so she mixed up the dough yesterday. The cookies will be baked after school tomorrow.

More cast iron friends...

I mentioned a few days ago about the cast iron Dutch oven that my parents found in their basement. I also have another great cast iron find to share with you. My 88 year old neighbor, Roger, is an Eagle Scout. Years before when he could he would camp out, and he had a camp Dutch oven. Two years ago when we had our community garage sale, he mentioned it to me. I told him I would take it. He wanted to give it to me, but I paid him $5 dollars for it. He wouldn't take a penny more. I did buy the gloves and the lifter new. Now all I need is a chimney to light my charcoal and I'll be set. I have yet to use this one.

These are the skillets that I cook in all the time. I also have a 12 inch that is not in the picture.

I have completely rid myself of all other types of fry pans. Everyone has learned to cook in these, but I am the only one who seems to know how to clean them.

French Bread...

This morning I wanted to try making some French bread. I have done this before using different recipes with mixed results. These loaves were made using the Easy French Bread recipe in the More With Less Cookbook. This dough was very soft and light. I did use 2 cups of whole wheat flour along with the 4.5 cups of white flour. I rose the dough once in a bowl for about 1 hour. Punched it down and let it rest another 15 minutes before shaping it into these loaves. Instead of greasing my cookie sheets I used parchment paper. It makes clean up so much easier, and I can reuse the sheets of paper.

This was the bread after it was shaped and risen the second time.



I slit the tops and brushed an egg wash on the top. My egg wash was 1 egg and 2 Tbsp. of water. At this point I could have added poppy or seseame seeds, but I generally don't add seeds to my breads. Some of the kids have braces, and my husband can take a lot of seeds with his partial. So, I stay away from added seeds.



I baked these at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. They look great.



We had one of the loaves for lunch along with a leftover pasta bake.

By the way, I did get those celery seeds planted that I mentioned last week. I will get the pictures up tomorrow.

Blessings...

Cast Iron Kitchen

Can you believe that this lovely cast iron Dutch oven was lurking in my parents basement completely unbeknownst to me? A year or so ago, my parents were cleaning out their basement and had the notion to call me, to ask if I wanted a few cast iron pieces that they found. I jumped at the chance. My dad showed up at my house with this beauty and two other fry pans. I was amazed that I had not known about their existance in the dark recesses of my parent's basement. I don't ever remember my mom cooking with cast iron. My maternal grandmother did. She made me the most delicious scrambled eggs in her cast iron fry pans. My grandmother passed away when I was 11 years old, and after that it was nearly 15 years before I ate scrambled eggs. I did try them here or there, but none could match the flavor and texture of those fantastic eggs made with loving hands by my dear grandma.

I don't know if this Dutch oven was hers or not, I will have to ask my mom. I can tell you that I use this pot all the time in the winter. It cooks just as well as my crockpot in a fraction of the time. So, if I forget to plan ahead, I can have a crockpot recipe cooked for dinner. I did this on Saturday night. I decided to make Spicy Beef and Beans which is a recipe from my dear friend Crystal Miller. I started with my ingredients.



It was easy to quickly brown up the beef in the Dutch oven.



All the ingredients go into the pot all at once and then I simmered it for about an hour while I baked my brown rice in the oven. I served it with a salad and fruit.

TIGHT AUGUST BUDGET

The month of August has put us in a tight place money wise. We have annual bills due this month, and I need to save us every possible penny.

I have planned out each meal for the month. Yes, that is for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I have also decided for ease of planning to make one breakfast and lunch plan and rotate it each week of the month. This has made things much easier for me who tends to over think everything.

Part of this plan includes me making English muffins and bagels each week. Buying them is out of the question. That would add $10 to my bill, and I already own all the staples necessary to make these items. I have a tried and true English muffin recipe thanks to Alton Brown of Good Eats fame. I was a little leery of making bagels. I did attempt making bagels once. It was several years ago, and my results were less than spectacular. Well, after searching and searching I was able to come up with a usable recipe. I actually combined a few recipes that I found on line and one that a friend sent me. I made a couple of errors, but they turned out great. One of my errors was not making the whole big enough, so I ended up with holeless bagels. It was a little strange, but it did not affect the taste. I also thought they could have been a little sweeter. So, I will adjust that next time. I told the children that next week I would try making them cinnamon raisin bagels.

Since this is only the end of week 1, my motivation is strong. I hope this continues to be the case. Only time will tell.

Blessings,
Jennie