Bread

Freezing greetings, Dungeon Meshi Maniacs!  As I type this we at DM HQ are snowed and iced in place thanks to Winter Storm Blair.  I will say being stuck at home isn't nearly as dangerous as being stuck in a dungeon.  But a slime still has to eat so luckily this is a cooking week!  What's on the menu this time? It's one of our oldest recipes!  Handed down from the most ancient times. None other than Bread!

 "Wait a minute, Nih. This is Cooking Dungeon Meshi where we eat monsters.  Surely you mean Flumph Bread, you nutty bird."  Nope.  Plain old normal bread.  No monsters this time so no need to find a real world analog.  WAIT! Get back here. There's no greater good than bread!  So simple that anyone can make it out of the cheapest ingredients. BEHOLD!

Flour, water, milk, salt, oil, and yeast.  That's it.  That's all you need for bread! Beautiful.  Baking rules. What say you, Senshi?

 Can you feel the excitement?  If you are a reader of Dungeon Meshi you'll notice that I'm missing an ingredient.  Senshi found some starter for his bread.  Starter is a fermentation of yeast that can be used to punch up the flavor of your bread.  Where does that flavor come from?  The wild yeast and microbes floating all around you!  The air you breath is disgusting.  But the yeast in the air is why some breads taste better in certain regions vs. others.  Sourdough from the Bay Area?  Fantastic!  Sourdough from Tennessee. Not the same!  I'm not using a starter for a simple reason. I don't keep one.  I find them more trouble than they're worth.  It's practically a pet that you have to take care of. My bread may not be winning fancy blue ribbons but it'll still be bread!

Now that we have the ingredients what do we have to do?  First we need to wake that yeast up.  This is done by mixing it into the water.  Problem is yeast is rather fussy. The water cannot be too cold and cannot be too hot. The goldilock range is between 100 to 115F.  I lack the skills to put my finger into water and judge the temp so an electronic thermometer to the rescue.

Thank you, Thermo. Now that you have nice temp you just dump the yeast right into the water.

Just let that yeast sit around for five minutes?  It's good to give the yeast time to wake up.  Nobody likes to immediately start working right after waking up.  You have to stretch first, shake off the sleepys.  While the yeast is getting itself together mix everything but the flour into a pot and heat them up to...you guessed it...100 to 115F.  Food just likes to be at that temp!  Once you hit that heat it's time to dump the yeast in.

Yummy!  Looks like very bad soup!  But we are making bread so we have to add the final ingredient. The flour!  Just dump almost all of it in there. You save some flour for later.

Mix until it is together but still kinda wet.  Now's the time for the most fun part of baking. The waiting!

This is the first rise.  Just let the dough sit around while the yeast pigs out on the sugar and farts and burps air into the flour making the mixture bigger!  Once again with feeling, Nature is DISGUSTING!  How long you sit is up to you but no less than fifteen minutes.  OH!  Remember how I'm snowed and iced in?  Yeast likes warmer temps to really get rising so a freezing house isn't a great place. Here is a nice magic trick for baking on cold days.  Cover your bowl with a damp cloth and put into a cool oven with the oven light on.  Works for this slime!

 Please overlook the state of my oven.  I love to use it and am bad at cleaning it.  Once your dough has risen time to dump that thing out onto a flour dusted counter and knead!

Kneading bread is so much fun. You get to punch something, wring it, pull it with no concerns.  Just work out all your aggression into the dough!  Your bread will taste better the more of your hate that you put into it!  Look at what anger can do.

What do you think, Senshi?

Wow, I'm never going to get back into this guy's good graces.  Senshi is a stone cold taskmaster.  Once your dough has been sufficiently kneaded you've got some choices.  Do you want to make a loaf or rolls?  If we were doing a loaf we would need a little more time and form. Senshi made rolls in the manga so rolls is what I went with.  Which is the more fun choice anyway since you get to take the dough and make tiny balls!

This is why baking is so much fun.  You get to really play with your food!  I waited to preheat the oven till now because the rolls need a second rest!  Preheat the oven to 375 and at least give the little guys 15 minutes to sit around.

So much of baking is the waiting.  Which is great because it gives you time to clean up before the next steps.  Throw these little guys into the over for twenty to twenty-fiveish minutes.  Pull them out and viola!

Delicious! I was super happy with how these came out.  Very yeasty and full of rolly goodness. Since it's cold they are the perfect food.  Why?  When you split them open right out of the oven Hot actually comes out!  Also known as "steam". Another great part is if you made too much these freeze very well.  Bring them out when you need them for a dinner or a snack.  Just be sure to share with friends!  That's the whole point of baking.

Thanks for walking down the bread path with me, DMM's!  Keep warm and loaf up!  It's going to be cold so let the blessing of bread be with you.