Here’s the first recipe for Tuesdays with Dorie. Follow me on my journey of baking with 300 other souls that have joined this project to bake recipes from the book, Baking with Julia Child. We do this every other Tuesday and post our links to the blog, Tuesdays with Dorie. This week’s recipe for White Loaves can be found at Someone’s in the kitchen.
I haven’t baked bread from scratch in years. Mom and I used to bake bread when I was in Junior High School and that was a long time ago! So I had the day off and went for it, and what an adventure it turned out to be. I started kneading the dough with my roommate’s Cuisinart and that was going no where, the motor was no happy. Then I switched to my Kitchenaid and it got quite a workout, jumping all over the counter. After the first rising, my roommate took a look at the dough and thought it wasn’t kneaded enough. So I punched it down and into the Kitchenaid it went again, which was fine, since I forgot to put the butter in. Oops! Off to another 45 minutes of rising…
And then into pans and another rising… But since I don’t have any loaf pans, I used my cake pans.
And then finally into the oven for what ended up to be a very long time. After 45 minutes of baking, the loaves were just not getting that beautiful honey color. I didn’t know what I was doing wrong. Then I realized my mistake…my oven is way off, and I had compensated for it by 30 degrees, but in the wrong direction. Oops again! So after 45 minutes of baking in a very cool oven, I raised the temperature and baked it another 25 minutes. Then finally, Ta-da! The loaves come out to cool, which was the longest wait ever! But the house smelled like baked bread and that is one of the best smells in the world.
Now comes the taste test, and it turns out that the bread is delicious! Success! It was crusty on the outside, buttery on the inside. My roommate thought it was delicious too. And he’s the cook in the house, so that’s a great nod.
It’s a good thing I had the day off, ‘cuz it took all day. Bon Appetit!
Baking with Cori 
Excellent effort! Keep with it – bread baking gets quicker and easier with every try.
Thanks, now after readinga bunch of posts I want to make the cinnamon version.
It looks like a success! Glad you enjoyed it. The trickiest part to bread is all the time you have to plan for rising, etc.
Thanks. Mom was disappointed I used the mixer. LOL Imagine how much longer kneading it by hand would have taken.
That’s the beauty of bread – it is usually so forgiving (and still rewards us with great taste)
Looking forward to many more TWD adventures!
Me too. Can’t wait for the chocolate one.
I love the shape of your loaves! Several of us didn’t have two (or even one) loaf pan so it’s fun to see all the improvisation. And if they tasted good that’s all that matters, as that’s the most important part!
A word on the KA mixer: the recipe manual booklet says to never go above speed setting 2 when making a yeast dough. I only learned this (totally by chance) a few hours after I’d made my bread, but I recall that I did turn it down to 2 frequently to calm the violent dancing it was doing and the not-so-nice-smell it was making.
Thanks for the KA advice, I see so many had the same experience. I will keep it on 2 next time. 🙂
Nice job for your first time. Bread baking is wonderful. Thanks for stopping by my blog at http://www.praycookblog.com. It will be fun baking with you!
I love the shape you got from using cake pans for the loaves. It’s nice to know that there can be some leeway in bread-making.