Am I the only person who has a fear of making their own home made bread? I have wanted to attempt this for so long and keep finding excuses to not do it, that is until today. I pictured a frustrated disaster, a flat lifeless loaf that wouldn’t rise, an epic fail. That’s kind of negative from someone who is typically so positive but that was truly what I expected out of my bread making experience. I am so happy to report that I dove into the challenge today and am so impressed with the results! My kids are in utter shock that I made this bread we have almost eaten both loaves! It was heavenly!

I took the recipe off the back of the Gold Medal bread flour bag. Since I have never made bread in my life I thought these people should know their stuff with this recipe and they sure do! Their Gold Medal Classic White Bread recipe is awesome! I altered this recipe ever so slightly in parts so I will post how I made it using their recipe. For their recipe in completion visit their website at http://www.goldmedalflour.com.

Ingredients:

6 cups of Gold Medal better for bread flour

3 tbsp sugar

1 tbsp salt

2 tbsp shortening

2 packages of quick active dry yeast

2 1/4 cups very warm water

2 tbsp butter (I softened mine and rubbed it over bread as it came out of the oven)

In a large bowl stir 3 1/2 cups of the flour, the sugar, salt, shortening, and yeast until well mixed. Add warm water. Beat with electric mixer on low 1 minute. Beat on medium speed for 1 minute, scraping sides to get all remaining mixture. Stir in remaining flour 1 cup at a time to make the dough easy to handle. Place the dough on a lightly floured surface. Knead about 10 minutes or until the dough is smooth and springy. Grease a large bowl with shortening and place the dough in the bowl. Cover bowl loosely with plastic wrap andlet rise in warm place for about an hour or until it doubles in size. Grease the bottom and sides of 2 bread pans. Push fist into center of dough to deflate then divide into 2 equal pieces. Flatten each piece with hands then roll up tightly pressing each end underneath to seal. Place seam side down in pan and cover loosely with plastic and let rise in a warm place for about 1 hour more. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Bake the loaves for about 25 minutes or until golden brown. Brush butter over tops and let cool or do as we did and dive into it warm!

I shortened the directions from what the package says so again you can find their longer directions on their site or on the back of their flour. Thank you Gold Medal flour for a great bread recipe. Now that I accomplished this I can’t wait to make more, my mind is churning with ideas for add ins and fun loaves to make!