Bread making day

Yesterday afternoon was dedicated to making our bread for the month. I took advantage of Joe taking a nap and John being at school and had Daniel all to myself in the kitchen. I normally make it with all 3 boys so they can each get their little fingers into it, but yesterday thinking about the cleanup that comes with that shied me away. I also decided to take a break from the normal wheat bread and made 5 beautiful loaves of WHITE BREAD. I have a recipe that is to die for! Makes the moistest, yummiest, melt-in-your-mouth bread you can imagine. Read on for the recipe...



Family White Bread

8 C. flour
2 1/2 T. salt
1 C. sugar
2 1/2 T. dry yeast
1/3 C. mashed potatoes (Secret ingredient! Makes the bread very moist)
6 C. warm water
1 C. oil
4-8 C. additional flour
*You'll also need a Bosch mixer or equivalent*

Stir flour, salt, sugar and dry yeast together in your mixer. Then add the potatoes, water and oil. Using your bread hook, knead for 5 minutes. Then add 4-8 C. flour as needed until the dough cleans the sides and bottom of the bowl. Let the mixer knead the dough for 10 more minutes. Pour dough onto floured surface. The dough can be very sticky, I use flour liberally.



I pulled a chunk off for Daniel and let him go at it. He rolled out the dough, cut it into strips with the pizza cutter, then sprinkled cinnamon sugar over the top.

Form into 5 loaves and place in bread pans sprayed with nonstick spray. Turn oven to warm. When heated, turn oven off. Place pans in oven, shut door, and set timer for 30 minutes.



When 30 minutes is up, turn the oven on to 350 degrees and bake for 30 minutes.



And out comes golden deliciousness! Turn the loaves out onto a cooling rack and brush the tops with butter. Once they're cool I cut them into thin slices, put them in bread bags and freeze them. Then whenever we need another loaf of bread I can take one out and stick it in the fridge.

The best part about this bread? Eating it! The kids always devour bread fresh out of the oven. And who can blame them.

Dan enjoyed his "cinnamon sticks" dipped in frosting. Yum!