I spend a lot of time cooking. It has become one of my favorite pastimes, now that I have the time to invest. That is, I am no longer exhausted after a long day of work or school. I take a sort of meditative pleasure in the preparation - cutting vegetables, browning onions, stirring the soup. Yesterday, I spent 45 minutes cutting up two butternut squashes, and I didn't find it at all tedious. Prepackaged meals and fast food chains are becoming but a distant memory. Our health is thanking me.

There is, however, one food item that I have consistently been unable to make - bread. Every time I try, I end up with something like a brick, or a pancake, or otherwise inedible. The worst of it is that homemade bread is so much work, what with the kneading and the rising times, that each failure is all the more difficult to stomach. Those are the nights when we end up at McDonalds, even though each time we swear it is the last.

But I never wanted to give up on bread. I had visions of making my own bread regularly, so there would always be some handy for sandwiches and soups and snacks. The bread in this country is terrible. I wanted boulanger quality.

So when this recipe came along, I was ready to give it another go. I felt confident about it; I felt I understood how the recipe worked. And it sounded so easy, the kind of bread I could realistically make regularly. So I gave it a go.

The bread came out wonderfully. Boulanger delicious. So light and holey, and the crust was perfectly crispy, but not overly so. If you try this bread at home, I used 3 cups of organic Gold Medal flour, and just under 1 3/4 cups of water (I mixed the water in slowly, until the dough was quite wet, but not soupy). The temptation is to put it somewhere warm to rise, but it really does rise best at room temperature. Amazing stuff.

I baked the bread in this pot; a gift from my mother in law, though she doesn't know it yet (no, I don't have unauthorized access to her bank account - it was purchased with money she sent for my birthday, and I hadn't yet found the right thing to spend it on). This recipe takes a large, heavy dutch oven that can withstand very high oven temperatures. Mine is enameled cast iron.

Mmmmmmm ! c'est appétissant ! Mais quel est donc cet engin rouge ?

c'est un pot en fonte émaillée (?)

http://www.amazon.com/Lodge-Enamel-7-Quart-Dutch-Patriot/dp/B00023CGJI/sr=8-2/qid=1166307516/ref=pd_bbs_2/002-4379934-5874409?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden

Hello
Ci-joint la photo d'une "machine à pain"... toute ma famille s'y est mis... ça fait même les brioches et la pate à pizza. J'en profite pour vous souhaitez de très bonnes fêtes de Noël/
A bientôt
Bise
Sophie

Merry Christmas Sophie! I'm really glad to hear from you.