Guest Bloggers Heidi and Maude Bake Bread

It’s more than a bit ridiculous to call today’s post a guest post since Heidi has been with SPC from the start. I’ve been wanting to try to bake my own bread and reading Heidi’s family recipe, I don’t know why I’ve been intimated to try. This post was meant to run before Christmas but in the chaos of the holidays, it didn’t happen. It’s all my fault! But I can tell you that when Heidi was baking bread she would email me with descriptions of how great their house was smelling and how quickly the bread was disappearing. Most of all I love the picture that Heidi unearthed of a baking session with her Mom and sister in the 70s. I think we had the same wood paneling in our house. – C.M.

You baked your own bread? Really? Oh yes, yes I did.

I’m a little Coo Coo for Christmas. In fact, I start thinking about it right after Labour Day. And since I now have my own kids to spoil and celebrate and create magic for, my Christmas craziness has taken on a whole new dimension. My husband is forced to just stand back and deal with the fall out. I think I know what part of my problem is. I am gathering the highlights of Christmases past and trying to jam each and every special moment into one Christmas…this one. Like the time we made ALL the tree ornaments, or the one when my aunt made us all the same pajamas, the one where we went on a sleigh ride through the country, or the year that my three cousins, brother and sister and I slept in the same room and someone started laughing in their sleep which set us all off and eventually room by room the entire house woke up, everyone laughing and no one sure why.  Oh! Or the year I got my first pair of skates from Santa, or staying up late listening to my parents wrap presents and waiting to hear Santa on the landing filling the stockings. Oh, the excitement, the anticipation, the sheer magic of it all! And I want every Christmas for my kids to encompass everything from my entire childhood. It is nice to have goals, but it is a recipe for disaster.

So here’s a recipe that’s super easy, lots of fun and high impact.

This hails back to the 1970’s if not before. This photo was taken in 1978 which makes me 5  years old. My mother, sister and I baking bread. I may be biased, as even the smell of the rising yeast brought back a flood of happy memories, but fresh out of the oven with melted butter … heavenly. Oh yes, and being quite pleased with yourself tastes pretty good too.

I was lucky to have Maude join me in the baking. I don’t think it would have been such a delicious day had she not participated. Thankfully she was game and enjoyed the process.

*You’ll have to knead the bread … ” Maude was good to about 9 cups, then she needed some help.

*We also made rolls, just be sure to make them half the size you want them to be remembering that they will double in size before you put them in the oven where they will continue to rise. My buns needed another 10 minutes in the oven … they were giant!