Country Bread

I love bread. If I could only eat one food for the rest of my life, I would choose bread (of course, with some cheese or peanut butter to go with it). After my not-so-successful attempt at focaccia, I was wary of trying again. I'm glad I did though - this bread was fantastic!

This recipe took two days and involved some planning. First, I had to make a "bread sponge," which was a combination of flour, water, and yeast. After waiting a few hours, I had to "feed" the sponge. A very funny experience! By the time I wanted to use it the next day, the sponge had grown and bubbled and had a sticky and strange consistency.

The actual process of making the bread dough was not bad at all! I used the stand mixer to knead the dough, which saved my arms a lot of energy. The only difficult part was waiting while the bread rose! Then, I tossed the loaves into the oven over a dish of water (to produce steam to crisp the crust) and soon my bread was ready. The crust was hard and chewy and the inside was light and delicious. I knew I had done well when I brought it over to a friend's house for dinner and they were surprised to hear that I had made it myself!