Marilyn Sloper

Gardening and baking are my two main "loves". Tomatoes, peppers, squash, eggplant, herbs, brussel sprouts, broccoli, kale, garlic.... It's so much fun to grow things!

Years ago I started out making a no-knead French bread recipe ("Joy of Cooking" cookbook, 1973-1974 edition). Since then I have learned that making bread is not scary at all.

One of my favorite things to do is to toss 4-5 cups of white flour into a mixing bowl, a teaspoon of salt, 2 tablespoons of sugar and a package of any kind of yeast (rapid rise/original, makes no difference).

I mix the dry yeast, salt and sugar right into the flour, then add enough warm water (little by little) to make a soft, sticky dough. (Sometimes the dough comes out stickier than other times - doesn't matter).

Cover the mixing bowl of dough with a wet, wrung-out hand towel or a few paper towels and set the bowl in a warm place until it rises about double in size. Punch it down with your hand, then pull off pieces of the dough. You'll want each piece to be about 2-3 inches long and not very thick. 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick is good.

NOTE: You can also just remove the dough ball from the bowl, roll it out on a floured countertop until it's 1/2 inch thick and cut your slices so they will look neat. But I just pull off/smoosh/stretch each piece with my hands instead of rolling out the dough. I like the irregular sizes.

Lay your dough slices/pieces on a floured surface to start rising again while you start to heat up your frying pan. Put your heat on low/medium and put a stick of butter (or margarine) in the fry pan to melt.
When your fry pan is all warmed up, place your dough pieces in it, then cover the pan with a lid. Let the dough pieces cook for about 8-10 minutes, then remove cover and turn the pieces over. Don't bother putting the cover back on because you'll want all excess water to start evaporating now.

After another 5-8 minutes, taste one of the cooking dough pieces to see if it is still "doughy" in the middle or if it has a nice "bread" texture to it. If it does, then that batch is finished. But if you want them to be golden brown, you can continue to cook them on low heat until they turn a rich golden tan/brown on both sides. Cooking them longer won't hurt them or dry them out at all and the golden brown crust gives them LOTS of flavor, too.

I always let my dough pieces get very golden-tan on both sides before I remove them from the fry pan.

Use them in place of pita bread or potato chips for assorted dips and hummus. Use them as a "bread" when serving spaghetti, soup, stews, etc. They are also great as a breakfast item in place of toast. These are great in place of biscuits, too. They reheat well, also.

NOTE: TO MAKE ENGLISH MUFFINS: After this dough rises the 1st time and is punched down, then you can pull off a piece of dough the size of 2-3 large meatballs, pat it into one ball, then gently flatten it a bit. Make it almost the size of an English muffin. Then set it aside and make more until you use up the dough. Let these muffins about double in size.

Now: Once your muffins have almost doubled in size, set your skillet on low-medium with a stick of butter or margarine in it. When the skillet finishes heating up, lay your muffins in the melted butter or margarine. Cover the pan. Let it cook for 15 minutes. (Don't peek!) Then remove cover, flip muffins and cook an additional 10-15 minutes on the other side. They should be golden-tan on both sides. If they are darker, lower your heat. Taste one and make sure it's texture is "bread" and not "doughy".

Once you eat these muffins, you'll always want to make them.

Use milk instead of water for a softer, more tender muffin. But after trying these both ways, I prefer these made with water. Water gives the more traditional English muffin texture.