Frugal Friday: bread making

Who can save you $40 a month? Saskatchemom can!

Before I had my children, making bread was something that I had tried a few times before and failed at miserably.  I would get a craving for my grandmother's homemade buns and try to make them.  The result, however, was always a disappointment.  They would be too yeasty, too dry, or come out of the oven hard as rocks.  While I loved cooking and could whip up just about anything without a recipe, baking was not my strong suit, most likely because I had to follow a recipe and measure stuff (Boring!).  
After P and D started eating solid food, and I started trying to save money wherever I could, I decided to try it again.  At the grocery store, I was getting more and more frustrated because I was determined to feed my children natural foods with as few preservatives and artificial ingredients as possible.  If you've ever read the ingredients on a loaf of grocery store bread, you know that there are way too many ingredients that are unidentifiable as food products. I also knew I could make it myself for a fraction of the cost.  I was determined to learn the skill of breading making.  

I dug out an old cook book about baking and began reading up on how to make good bread.  This was helpful because I learned what temperature my liquid should be to bloom my yeast and how to know when my dough has been kneaded enough.  I found a recipe for whole wheat bread.  I had to make it many times before I perfected my technique and tweaked the recipe to suit me.  I also got my moms recipe and I use that often as well, although it uses only 50% whole wheat flour so it is more of a treat.  I will include that recipe today, since its the one I used this week.  Stay posted for other bread recipes in the future!

Moms buns 

(Her signature baked good, not the body part!)

Step 1:

2 tbsp active dry yeast 
1 tsp sugar
1 cup warm water

I heat my water in the microwave for 1 minute, but it depends on your microwave.  To be sure, use a thermometer to test the water temperature.  It should be between 105-115 degrees Fahrenheit.  Once the water is warm, stir in the sugar and yeast and set aside to allow the yeast to bloom.  It will start to bubble up and smell yeasty.  This will take about 5 minutes.  Make sure your yeast is fresh!

Step 2:

2 eggs
3/4 cup oil
2 tsp salt 
2 cups boiling water
2 cups cold milk
1 cup sugar 
6 cups all purpose unbleached flour
5.5 cups whole wheat flour

I use my stand mixer for this dough, but if you're strong enough to do it by hand, go for it (I just don't have the muscles!).  In a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, beat together the eggs, oil, salt, boiling water, cold milk and sugar until the sugar is dissolved and the ingredients are all well combined: . Add 2 cups of all purpose flour and beat again until well blended. Add the yeast mixture and beat again. Then add 2 cups whole wheat flour and beat again. Next add 2 cups all purpose flour and beat again until combined.  Switch your paddle attachment to your dough hook, and continue adding flour, first 2 cups whole wheat, then 2 cups all purpose, and lastly 1.5 cups whole wheat to add up the total 11.5 cups.  This recipe makes a  very large batch, and it is almost too much for my mixer.  It gets a little messy at the end (as you can see in the picture), but it is worth it for me to not have to do all the work of kneading.  If you have a bigger mixer, it will work great.  You do need a pretty strong, heavy duty mixer, mine is a Kitchen-aid.  The dough is quite sticky and soft. Remove it from the mixer and knead it for just a few minutes on the counter, just until it all comes together into a smooth ball.  Use a bit of flour on your hands and the counter top if necessary, but use as little as possible.  This dough needs only a little kneading if it's been beaten well at each stage in the mixer. You'll know it's ready because if you poke it with your finger, it will bounce back and not show a dimple.

Step 3:

Place the dough in a large oiled bowl. I divide mine in half and place it into 2 large bowls because I don't have a bowl large enough for this recipe. Cover with plastic wrap and then a kitchen towel.  Set aside in a warm spot and let it rise to double, about 1.5 hours.  Punch the dough down and let it rise again for 1.5 hours, or until doubled.  I place my dough below my under cabinet lights and leave them on for 15 minutes or so to get the spot nice and warm and get the dough rising.  Then I shut them off so that the dough doesn't rise too quickly.  If the dough rises to quickly it wont have time to develop the flavour that is so good in fresh bread.  

Step 4:

Using a little softened  butter on your hands, as well as a little bit of flour (no more than 1 cup)  on the counter to prevent too much sticking, form the dough into buns, loaves or rolls.  Place them on pans, cover with a kitchen towel and let rise again to double.  Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 350 Fahrenheit.

I used this batch of dough to make 3 loaves of bread, 12 dinner rolls, and 16 orange sweet rolls.  Since I let my dough rise in two bowls, it was already divided in half.  I used one bowl for the 3 loaves of bread.  To form the loaves, I use my bench scraper to divide the dough in 3.  Then I use my hands to flatten each peice into a rectangle.  Next, I roll up the rectangle and pinch the edge into the roll, then tuck in the ends and pinch them together.  I place the loaf into the loaf pan and push it down to fill the corners.

The other bowl was for the buns.  I formed the dinner rolls first and then rolled out the rest of the dough for the sweet rolls.  To make the dinner rolls I cut small pieces of dough from the bowl using a sharp knife.  I pinch and roll into into a ball, and then I like to push it through the space between my pointer finger and thumb to get a really smooth, round bun.  This also helps me to make the buns all a uniform size.  When I push the dough through my fingers, I can see if it is too small or big.  If it is too big, I can pinch off a little of the dough from the bottom of the bun.  If the bun is too small I can push a tiny piece of dough up into the middle of the bun to make it the right size.  My buns were small enough that I fit 12 into a 9 inch cake pan (see picture below).

Next, I took the rest of the dough and rolled it into a large rectangle about the same size as my small cookie sheet (you could also use a 9 x 11 baking dish for this.  
I used a knife to spread 1/2 cup of softened butter evenly over the dough.  Next, in a small bowl I combined 1 cup brown sugar, 1 tsp vanilla, and the zest of 2 oranges.  You could also add 1 tsp of cinnamon here, though I did not.  I used my hands to sprinkle and spread this over the sheet of dough, then I rolled it up as tightly as possible and pinched the edge together in much the same way I had finished the other loaves.  I sliced it into 16 pieces and placed it into a greased pan that was also lined with parchment paper.  Then I covered all of the formed dough with kitchen towels and set it aside to rise again for about 45 minutes, or until doubled in size. The loaves will rise up above the side of the pans, and the buns will begin to grow into each other and form one mass of dough.   Preheat the oven to 350 Fahrenheit.

Formed dough before it has risen

The risen dough in the oven

Bake at 350 15-20 min.  Then remove the buns from the oven and allow the loaves to bake for another 10 minutes.  Once the baked goods are removed from the oven, take them out of the pans and set them on cooking racks to come to room temperature.  

One roll is missing, we ate it straight from the oven

P and D enjoyed the beaters from the frosting

I topped my orange sweet rolls with a cream cheese glaze I made by beating together 1/2 cup softened cream cheese, 1 tsp vanilla, the juice of one orange, and 1/2 cup icing sugar.