EASY FRENCH BREADfeatured

I’ve had 33 roommates. Not a typo. From Freshmen year in college till about 4 years ago when I got my own place, I can count 33 roommates and this isn’t even counting all of the freeloaders who have lived on my couches, attics or floors over the years. That might make the total around 50. Also not a typo.

Some were straight up crazy, but most were pretty awesome. But with all of these roommates, only one loved to bake and cook as much as me: Sarah. Sadly she had the audacity to go back to school to become a nurse practitioner which meant she said “so long” to living LA. Boo for me. Yeah for her.

But let’s talk french bread. I grew up making bread with my mom (more about that at a later date), so I think I developed a sense of superiority about it. I knew how to do it. I’ve done it my whole life. There were rules and if you didn’t follow those rules, the bread didn’t turn out. This was straight up fact in my brain. So the first time I watched Sarah make bread in our kitchen, there was a ton of judging going on… inside my head. Her recipe wasn’t following the rules. It wasn’t going to turn out. I watched her shape the bread. Huh. Interesting. It looks good. I mean, it looks like it’s going to work. But she didn’t follow all the rules, so no way is it going to bake right. I walked away and came back. Sarah said it only needed 30 minutes to rise and it only needed to rise one time. Say what? This is going to be a disaster. No way will the yeast act that quickly. After 30 minutes the bread looked perfect. What the? This was blowing my mind. Not surprisingly when she took the bread out of the oven it was golden and perfect and it took half the time my bread recipes took. Sarah for the win. Luckily she is a nicer person than me and shared this recipe which in turn I share with all of you.

This is a very straight forward french bread. It’s a perfect recipe to try if you’ve never made bread before. It’s very forgiving. It ain’t fancy pants bread; but it’s quick, easy and pretty perfect hot right out of the oven slathered with butter and jam.

Recipe: Easy French Bread  |  Soundtrack: Banks

• FOR THE YEAST
• 2 pkgs rapid rise yeast
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 1 tsp sugar
• FOR THE BREAD
• 2 cups hot water
• 3 tbsp sugar
• 1 tbsp salt
• 5 tbsp vegetable oil
• 6 1/2 cups flour + more for dusting the surface of the counters
• 1 egg white

Directions:
To prepare the yeast: You need to activate the yeast (this is called ‘proofing”) before you add it to the main bread mixture and to do this dissolve the 2 packages of yeast and 1 tsp of sugar into the warm water. If the water is too hot, it will kill the yeast and if it’s too cold, it won’t activate it. It should be right in the middle. If you have a thermometer it should be at 105°- 110º. If you have the temperature right, you will slowly start to see the yeast foam up and grow. Let this sit on your counter while you start on the bread. Approx 5 minutes

Using a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook, combine the hot water, sugar, salt, oil and 3 cups of the flour. Beat well. Add in the yeast mixture. Mix in the remaining 3 1/2 cups flour. Mix well.

Allow the bread to rest in the mixer for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, mix it again for about 45 seconds. Repeat the process of resting for 10 minutes and beating 3 more times.

Turn out the dough onto a floured surface. Knead twice until dough is lightly covered with flour. Divide dough in half. Roll each half into a rectangle. Roll up and shape into a loaf. Pinch all of the ends shut. Place the loaf on a greased jelly roll pan. Put the pinched end down so the pretty side is up. Gash top 3-4 times and bruch with egg white. Repeat with the second loaf of bread. I put them both on the same pan.

Let rise 30 minutes covered. Bake at 375º for 30-35 minutes. I start to check at 25 minutes to make sure it doesn’t get too dark. Remove from the oven and place loaves on a cooling rack.

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