World's Best Breadsticks

Ryan the 3L (of TSLRF fame and whom I've known since I was knee high to a duck) came into town to visit family and crashed at my place this weekend. As far as I'm concerned any excuse to cook is a good excuse to cook, and old friends are one of the best excuses. We did a ton of stuff and I'm sure I'll do a couple posts about it, but I think the best of the cooking was a new recipe I found for bread sticks.

The dough was pretty simple (compared to double-rise bread dough anyway) and they only had to rise for 15 minutes (more if you had more time). Even with proofing the yeast, you can make these in 30-35 minutes no problem. Once they came out of the oven, I brushed them with garlic salt and Italian herb mix and they were just awesome.

One trick I have learned is placing a small oven safe pan with water into the oven as soon as you start to preheat, and keeping it in clear through your cooking. This technique is used with baguettes generally, and gives the bread sticks a nice crisp crust without drying out the middle.


1 cup warm water (between 110-115 degrees)
3 tablespoons brown sugar
2.5 teaspoons of yeast
1/4 cup oil
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups of bread flour

Mix brown sugar and warm water until sugar is dissolved, add yeast and allow to proof at least 5 minutes or until foamy (I like to say it should look like the foam on a latte). Add salt and oil and mix in flour, adding 1 cup at a time. Roll out on floured surface until it's about 10x12. Using a sharp knife or pizza cutter, cut into approx. 3/4 inch strips (I like them about 5-6 inches long, but it's personal preference). Give each stick a twist and place on a baking sheet to rise in a warm place for at least 15 minutes.

Preheat oven to 375 while dough is rising, for crispy crust place half-full oven safe pan unto oven rock below or even with where bread sticks will bake.

Once bread sticks have risen (15-25 minutes) place in oven for 10-12 minutes. When done, remove from oven and baste with melted butter. Sprinkle sticks liberally with garlic salt and your choice of Italian herbs. Serve hot with your choice of dipping sauce!

Any Good Recipes?

So, by some insane fluke I managed to get a "tasting" (aka interview) for a local coffee shop to make their pastries and breakfast stuffs. I have some things floating around my head (I've seriously been driving Lila and Gracie insane because I won't shut up about recipes) but I really really want to try out as many things as I can!

Anyone have any tried and true or interesting recipes they'd like to share?

Scrumptious French Toast

When I'm lazy, and I don't want to really cook, I make breakfast for dinner. Pancakes were my mom's standby, and mine is usually some sort of egg dish. Last night I didn't have time to pull out any meat to de-thaw, and after chasing down 6 rogue chickens in the garage I didn't feel like being super creative. Enter my Wifey Bread cinnamon concoction.

Ever since I made the Yet Un-named Cinnamon Version of Wifey Bread, I've been stealing little bits off of it to sooth my cinnamon roll cravings. Since that craving was in high gear, I decided to use the YUNCV to make French Toast. I whipped up 4 eggs, and a 1/2 cup of milk and 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract in a shallow bowl, dipped the bread and threw it in a frying pan. I flipped each piece after about 2 minutes, re-flipping if it wasn't to my liking color wise. Once I pulled them from the pan I threw on some whipped butter, powdered sugar, and topped it with some maple syrup.

Viola, breakfast for dinner is served!

The Wonder of Wifey Bread

I am so thankful for TOR's Wifey. She sent me an amazing bread recipe quite a while back, and it's so easy and amazing I haven't bought any store bread since. I did have one epic bread making fail, but I was on the phone with a friend and spaced and added 1.5 tablespoons of salt instead of teaspoons. It looked alright, but tasted like a salt lick. (That had nothing to do with the recipe, it had to do with my tendency to be easily distracted by things that make noise or have shiny parts. Unfortunately for my bread dough, my phone is both of those things.)

The only issue with the recipe is that it makes two loafs. The Boy and I just can't go through bread that fast. Wifey came up with the ingenious idea to make the second portion into dinner rolls, but I decided Monday night to get a bit tricky. I was making dough anyway, but I had nothing to do with the extra. I called my mom who makes amazing caramel rolls (I'll snag her recipe and post it sooner or later) and asked it I could use the spare dough for those. She said no, but promised to call me with her recipe (she didn't).

So now I'm stuck with extra dough, and a evil craving for caramel rolls. I finally decided to get a bit creative and hopefully fix both problems. Instead of just kneading the bread between the 1st and 2nd rise, I rolled it out a bit (okay I lied, I just mushed it into a rectangle-ish shape) and grabbed my ground cinnamon. I spread a thin layer over the dough, the halved it unto itself. I repeated this a bunch of times (and after the first loaf, I figured out to alternate the direction I folded from to make the pattern more uniform).

I also put a light coating of brown sugar and butter on top of the loaf as it was cooking (I suggest about 1/2 way through, to really satisfy my craving for caramel rolls. If you like a very sweet bread, you can also use a cinnamon/sugar mix for the layers. I love Wifey bread because it's just so darn versatile, so I'm sure I'll have more recipes for you soon.

Oh, and sorry I don't have any pics my camera died. I'll try to update with some later.

Praise be to the Bread Gods!

I made my first ever batch of bread last night! It turned out perfectly, I was so impressed with the recipe. Most the times I can remember having homemade bread, it just doesn't have the level of put-togetherness at store bought bread. You end up having to chuck big chucks, and then it falls apart anyway. This bread is solid but not dense, and just sweet enough taste great without being practically dessert.

I have to give credit where credit is due, this recipe isn't something I came up with, not even close. Wifey (aka TOR's wife) on TSLRF gave it to me, and I'm eternally grateful. As I said, I've never been overly impressed with homemade bread in general, and I usually screw up a recipe (at least in the baking category) once before I get it right, or even close. This one I'm 95% sure I screwed up somehow and it still turned out just fine. The only thing I noticed was that I didn't seem to get a full rise the second time, but maybe I'm just using bigger loaf pans, I don't know. I'll throw the recipe in the comments section.

The Boy and I got through an alright amount of bread a week, but we really don't use that much so I'm pawning my second loaf off on our neighbors. They are a newly-wed couple and I've known the man of the new two-some for many, many moons. They also received the first 3 pints of jam I gave anyone. Apparently May (the wife) was a bit worried that I'm giving them all these spoils and they don't have anything to give in return. I assured David (the hubby) that if nothing else, they were my guinea pigs so it wasn't a big deal.