"French" Bread

Much as I would have liked to title this more simply "French Bread" without the extra set of quotation marks...sadly my research indicates that under French Law no loaf may be called "French Bread" unless the only ingredients are yeast, flour, salt, and water. And the loaf I made also called for a tablespoon of sugar, so apparently it's not too authentic...

Anyway, I wanted to mix up my bread usage for the week, and for dinner I had planned on making Mom's fantastic "pasta with cream sauce" recipe (which makes an inordinate amount of cream sauce for the amount of spaghetti it calls for). So, I thought I'd make an easy bread to go with dinner.

Start off by proofing 3 3/4 teaspoons of yeast in 2 cups of warm water and 1 tablespoon of sugar. After a few minutes stir in 1 tablespoon of salt and about 5 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour, and start kneading. As has been the case these last few weeks, this is an almost painfully easy dough to knead...not really an epic struggle at all. Much more like the those fights in action movies against not the chief villain but rather the random, nameless henchmen: the outcome is never in doubt, and the hero barely has to break a sweat. Oh well.

Put in a buttered bowl and place in the oven, turned to it's lowest possible temperature setting, and allow to undergo the

First (and only!!) Rising (1 hour and 30 minutes)
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I'm afraid this last week has been a blur of lots of work and not too much of a life outside of the physics building. Classes all loaded up on work before Spring break (the week after next). And then on Friday (when I usually only have one class to teach in the late afternoon) another TA got sick and I ended up teaching two extra classes...from 8:00-10:00 and 10:00-12:00 in the morning. I didn't mind so much, but by the end of the day I was definitely a little hoarse and more than a little tired of "Discussion week 7: Impulse and Momentum."

Anyway, assorted high points of the week... (1) Wine-and-cheese party, immediately preceded by cooking dinner with friends last weekend ( [number of times I have turned down an offer that is phrased something like "let's just make a big-old roast this weekend"] = 0). (2) Getting a Maine state quarter in my change from lunch today (even if I'm still sad that they didn't go with the Mt. Katahdin design for the quarter). (3) Saturday brunch provided by the physics department (recruiting next year's crop of grad students). (4) A fortune cookie informing me that "Good things are being, said about you." (What the devil is that comma doing there?) (5) Finishing a pair of problem sets about an hour ago (a bit sad that that makes this list...but it's just been that sort of week I suppose).
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Take the dough out of the oven, punch it down, and divide into two pieces. Flatten each piece into a rough rectangle, then fold in half and roll up into a tube (this would have been so much easy, with better looking results no doubt, had I happened to have a baguette pan). Place the loaves onto a cookie sheet that has been liberally sprinkled with cornmeal. Make those sweet-looking diagonal slashes on top of the loaves, brush the loaves with cold water, and then place the cookie sheet in a cold oven. Set the temperature to 400 degrees, and let bake for 35 minutes.
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Tasting verdict: Tasty! This bread turned out very light but with a pretty close texture. Also, it is incredibly absorbent, which made it great for sopping up extra sauce. Since there is no fat in the bread I don't think it will last more than a few days (and it wouldn't really have made for terribly interesting sandwiches, anyway), but I think it will make for good breakfast/dinner bread while it lasts. I'm particularly anticipating some delicious French-toast-breakfasts!

Currently reading: Midterm coming up next Thursday. Ergo my current reading will mostly involve going over "Mathematics for Physics II: A Set of Lecture Notes" for the next few days...

Next week: Since by next weekend it'll be spring break, I'll probably go with something relatively elaborate...any requests?