Basic White Bread

                

             So my car is broken down, but I’m not complaining. I actually think that it may be a blessing in disguise. You see, without a car I can’t drive around town wasting gas and buying things that I don’t need. Now don’t get me wrong, relying on people for rides is a bit of a bummer, but its not the end of the world. I live close enough to school and to work that if worst came to worst I could probably just walk. And now that I think about it, I’m not really sure why I felt that the need to drive a whopping mile and a half to school everyday in the first place! I am happy to be embracing a “European” habit, and I am happy that I am leaving less of a carbon foot print!

              So today marks my last day of studying for finals, and of course I am studying at my apartment since I can’t drive. Plus its raining, so even if I wanted to get out of the house I couldn’t. Well I guess technically I could, but who wants to walk to school in the rain when they don’t have to?! You know, to be honest I actually find it very cleansing and relaxing to walk in the rain, but I don’t really find it relaxing or cleansing to hang out on campus soaking wet. 

           Okay so to sum this up and relate it to baking, I decided that today was the perfect day to bake some fresh bread! I am a big fan of the kitchn.com, and recently they posted this recipe for basic white bread. I have made it twice so far, and I must say that both times it has turned out amazing! 

I didn't include the recipe in this post because I didn't modify it very much from the original. However there is a link to the original recipe in the above paragraph.


(Just on a side note: I did use unsweetened almond milk instead of cows milk when I made this bread and it turned out just fine!)  

But anyhoo... here are some bread photos for you!  

Kneading the dough in my Kithcnaid stand mixer... Thanks Mom! 

This recipe yields two loafs, so here are two dough balls resting after first rise. 

Bread fresh out of the oven!

Perfect.

Here’s a tip for if your bread if rising slowly: Go ahead and preheat your oven to 425º, then place your loaves on the stove with the oven door left cracked open. The heat from the oven should help your dough rise faster. Today it took my bread almost an hour to rise.

Music to bake to... because I listened to Bombay Bicycle Club all day while I was studying.