Breakfast Bread

I like making my own bread because, amongst other things, I can experiment with different types of flour. My standard loaf I use a three part mix of; white, brown and semolina flour. I can also control the amount of salt, and sugar in my bread and of course there are no dreaded ‘E’ numbers. [semolina flour is excellent for all kinds of uses instead of corn flour as a thickening agent for instance. I also like to use a course ground semolina flour almost like breadcrumbs. It makes a great crunchy chicken, I’ll tell you how another time.

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Making bread in the traditional way can be a little time consuming, but there are some really good machines on the market that make it a simple process. It takes me six minutes to get the ingredients into the machine.

When I have time though, I like to mix my dough early morning and let it rise until lunchtime. Then it needs ‘knocking back’ and leaving for a short time again, but the effort is well worth it.

Since I’ve had my new food mixer I’ve had really good results. It came with a dough hook and it certainly does make a really good dough. Even my chapattis have improved.

Today’s recipe is for Marmalade Bread, I know I shouldn’t eat it, but I can’t help it, it’s too good to resist.

This is what you do;

Put flour, yeast, salt, raisins in a bowl and mix together. Now shift them into your mixing bowl.

Break your egg into the milk, add the water and whisk them together. Spoon in your marmalade.

For a slightly different treat I use a red grapefruit marmalade which has a lovely tang to it.

Add the flour mix to the liquids and mix. If you have a mixer then let the machine do the work, otherwise once you have a dough, then turn it out onto a floured surface and knead it until your arms feel to be dropping off.

Place it somewhere warm, cover with a clean tea-towel to keep droughts out and allow it to rise for an hour or so. When the dough is twice the size it started, put your fist in it, and push it down. Turn the dough out again and give it a quick kneading again.

You can split the dough into 4 or more pieces or make a single loaf.

If I’m making small loaves, then once the dough is ready I roll them out a little bit and then roll them up like a swiss-roll. If you are making just one loaf then either use a loaf tin or roll it up the same.

Place them on a greased tin and bake on the centre shelf for 20-25 minutes at gas mark 7 or 220º centigrade. And then turn it down to gM 5 190º for another 5 mins.

Eat with thick butter and a strong coffee

You can glaze the finished loaf with a topping made from sugar and water.