The Daring Bakers Break Bread Together

As much as I’ve enjoyed all of the sweet escapades the Daring Bakers have been on, secretly, I’ve longed for something savoury. Trust the beautiful Tanna to answer my wishes!

For November, she chose our first non-dessert baking challenge: Tender Potato Bread from the book Home Baking by Naomi Duguid and Jeffrey Alford.

This has been a tough month for me between work and personal life and I’ll be very honest, for a split second I contemplated missing my very first Daring Baker challenge.

But I thought about Lis, and her determination to show up for each event (and the fact that she’d probably kick my butt if I didn’t do the challenge). I thought again about Tanna and the effort that she put into choosing a recipe. And I thought of bread baking, and how everytime I pull a loaf out of the oven, I feel renewed.

With this in mind, I set about making my very first bread that featured mashed potato as a main ingredient.

I wasn’t up to documenting the process as I often do. Something about snapping photos all along the way just didn’t appeal to me this time around. As much as I enjoy food photography, there was something about this bread that demanded my full attention. It was as though by me breaking away every few minutes to snap a photo, I’d be missing something important.

Instead, I mashed my potatoes and mixed them with water. I added yeast and flour. I waited patiently as my dough rose in our warm kitchen. While I would normally be running around trying to get a photo of the dough at just the right angle, I flipped through Home Baking and bookmarked a number of recipes I’d like to try.

Once my dough was ready to go, I opted for the simple loaf and was able to produce one 9 x 5-inch loaf and two 8 x 4-inch loaves. I let them rise a second time until they were puffy and beautiful and adorned them with butter and rosemary.

After a short visit to the oven, I pulled out three beautifully browned loaves.

I enjoyed the bread in the way that all warm bread should be enjoyed: slathered with butter. Tender, fresh and fluffy, this bread was delicious. It made me think of simplicity and wholesomeness. The bread that’s left will be used for sandwiches throughout the week.

I’d like to thank Tanna so much for pushing us once again past another obstacle. And I’d like to thank all the Daring Bakers for breaking bread in the month of November.

Ciao!

For the Tender Potato Bread recipe, please visit Tanna’s site.

To see what all the other Daring Bakers have done, please visit our official blogroll.