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| Quite possibly the worst loaf of bread ever! |
I have just finished baking what is quite possibly the worst loaf of bread ever manufactured since the first sheaf of wheat was harvested from a neolithic field in the pre-dawn of civilization. What you see pictured above is not my first, but my second attempt at Rapid White Bread in our foolproof bread making machine. The first attempt could not actually be called a loaf, so much as a glutinous glob of bio material that sort of rolled around in the machine like a giant booger. So, what I need from my friends and supporters is not advice on how to make bread, but recollections of their most catastrophic attempts at transforming flour, water, yeast and whatever other ingredients may have been included into something edible. It will make me feel so much better, knowing there are bakers more klutzy than myself out there. TLM.
PS: Ian, being the gentleman companion he is, says the bread is quite good 'actually'. But his assurances have not salved my wounded pride.
Wasn't it less than a couple of months ago that I decided to do a friend a big favour by presenting a loaf of fresh baked whole wheat bread? But how to do this when I had a ferry crossing and a 2-day conference beforehand?
ReplyDeleteA few days before leaving, I took the lump of dough, carefully kneaded it for 20 minutes and then wrapped it in wax paper and froze it.
The morning I left, I placed the frozen softball-sized lump in a beer cooler and set off. I placed the cooler on the mini balcony of my hotel room and told it to stay still. No yeasty heroics please!
Finally, the morning arrived and I brought the lump of dough to my friend's place. I tried to pull it out. It was alive (!) and pushing on all sides of the cooler trying to fulfill its destiny.
I eased it out and discovered that the wax paper had been absorbed by the blog and was torn into hundreds of fragments.
Well, bread is what I'd promised. I set to removing every flake of wax paper. What does baked wax paper taste like, I wondered. Is it toxic?
With every morsel of wrapping hopefully removed, I kneaded it for a few minutes and placed it in a greased bread pan wishing it to rise again!
It's all I could think about during the half hour left for the visit. I checked on it just as I was leaving. It was a lifeless lump.
I'd probably killed the yeast. What could I do? Run out with it, telling my friend that it had never existed? Should I tell him to allow it to rise for several hours? Should I tell him to throw it out?
I slunk out wondering what he thought of the whole wheat elephant I'd left him.
I heard a couple of days later that it did rise, there were no obvious signs of wax paper and that it tasted fine.
All I really know is, I have gathered wonderful friends around me who know never to hurt my feelings.
I always have been and remain terrified of making bread. Call it the Booger Effect.
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