Bread, Glorious Bread!

Alright.  This bread.  This bread deserves it's own blog post.  Why?  Because for 12 years I have been baking bread and for 12 years I have been looking for THIS BREAD.  Crusty on the outside, chewy with big air bubbles on the inside.  The kind of bread I'd usually pay a lot of money for in the store.  The kind of bread that impresses company.  The kind of bread that you dip in olive oil, dipping spices, and balsamic vinegar and it is PERFECTION.  

I'm almost tempted to not share this recipe and to simply make this bread for my friends and family and let them think that I am a kitchen goddess and that this recipe requires the kind of baking prowess found only by a summer spent working in a kitchen in France.  But I love my friends and family more than my baking reputation and it just seems WRONG not to share such a simple recipe!  Thank-you, thank-you to Emily at FrugalLivingNW for sharing this recipe!  Click HERE to see her amazing post with step-by-step directions complete with pictures.  

The first time I opened the oven to remove the lid from the dutch oven, I literally squealed with sheer delight! That probably sounds a bit ridiculous to most people, but my fellow foodies will understand.  I then rounded up everyone in the house and made them come look at it and listen to it crackle on the counter as it cooled.  Yes, I am that much of a bread lover!

Seriously, is that BEAUTIFUL, or what??  Yes, that came out of MY oven! :)  It really is as easy as she claims it is, and don't worry about making it fall when you flop it into the dutch oven.  I've made it three times already, and was sure I killed it each time, and yet each time it turns out this pretty!  

Here's the recipe, though I HIGHLY recommend taking a look at the original post as it was very helpful when making it the first time.  I've been using one of Dad's old clunky camping dutch ovens and it works great but is really heavy.  I've now added one of these beautiful dutch ovens to my list of items I'm dying to have in my kitchen someday.

Basic No-Knead Breadslightly adapted from Jim Lahey’s My Bread

6 cups bread flour (recommended) or all-purpose flour, plus more for work surface
1/2 t. instant or active-dry yeast
2 1/2 t. salt
2 2/3 c. cool water

1. In a large bowl, combine the flour, yeast, and salt. Add the water and stir until all the ingredients are well incorporated; the dough should be wet and sticky. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Let the dough rest 12-18 hours on the counter at room temperature. When surface of the risen dough has darkened slightly, smells yeasty, and is dotted with bubbles, it is ready.
2. Lightly flour your hands and a work surface. Place dough on work surface and sprinkle with more flour. Fold the dough over on itself once or twice and, using floured fingers, tuck the dough underneath to form a rough ball.
3. Generously dust a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with enough flour, cornmeal, or wheat bran to prevent the dough from sticking to the towel as it rises; place dough seam side down on the towel and dust with more flour, cornmeal, or wheat bran. Cover with the edges or a second cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours, until it has doubled in size.
4. After about 1 1/2 hours, preheat oven to 425 degrees. Place a 6-8 quart heavy covered pot, such as a cast-iron Dutch oven, in the oven as it heats. When the dough has fully risen, carefully remove pot from oven. Remove top towel from dough and slide your hand under the bottom towel; flip the dough over into pot, seam side up. Shake pan once or twice if dough looks unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes.
5. Cover and bake for 40 minutes. Uncover and continue baking for 10-15 more minutes, until the crust is a deep chestnut brown. The internal temperature of the bread should be around 200 degrees. You can check this with a meat thermometer, if desired.
6. Remove the bread from the pot and let it cool completely on a wire rack before slicing.

We Wish You a Merry Christmas!

It's been a wonderful Christmas, filled with family, friends, and traditions. We feel so blessed to have each other and to have the opportunity to celebrate the birth of our Savior!

Homemade Gingerbread Ornaments

A visit to Santa

I guess his present request is a secret this year!

One of the best pictures with Santa we've managed to get!

Christmas goodies for friends...gingerbread cookies, chocolate caramel pretzels, chocolate peanut butter balls, and homemade almond joys. Yummy!

Christmas Eve jammies and homemade rice bags to keep the kids warm at night. :)

Angels to Watch Over Them

As a Christmas gift to Ted and Jean, Melinda is compiling stories from family members detailing tender mercies in their lives.  As I wrote this for her, I thought that a copy should make its way onto the blog:

Angels to Watch Over Them

“And as they looked to behold they cast their eyes towards heaven, and they saw the heavens open, and they saw angels descending out of heaven as it were in the midst of fire; and they came down and encircled those little ones about, and they were encircled about with fire; and the angels did minister unto them.” – 3 Nephi 17:24

I have absolutely no doubt that our Heavenly Father loves our little ones.  His little ones.  Some of the most tender mercies I have witnessed have surrounded my children.  I often say I have no idea how people manage to raise children without the gospel and the whisperings of the Holy Ghost.  I can recall more than one occasion when my children’s very lives have been preserved by the grace of God. 

Tori was only a week old when she began making a sharp wheezing sound as she breathed in.  It would come and go, but as a new mother, one with little to no experience with babies, it was terrifying.  On three separate occasions, I took her in to our pediatrician.  I explained that she had episodes of wheezing and that she was retracting as she tried to inhale.  The doctor looked at Tori, breathing just fine in my arms, and gave me a knowing smile.  “This is your first baby, right?”  And with that, I was dismissed as an overly concerned new mom and sent on my way.  Each time I brought her in, his condescension thickened.  I hadn’t even made it home after the third appointment when Tori started wheezing in her car seat.  I burst into tears.  I reached home and for the first time as a parent, I fell to my knees for my child.  I told Heavenly Father that I knew something was not right, told Him how scared I was and how helpless I felt, and begged him to show me what to do.  I had not even risen to my feet when the phone rang.  It was Heidi calling, who had heard from Mom that Tori was sick and that I was taking her to Dr. Jones.  She told me this was the same doctor who had diagnosed Heidi with “paranoid new mom syndrome” when Mason was a baby and missed the hole in his heart that landed him in emergency surgery.  She urged me to get a second opinion.  When I did, we found out that Tori had pneumonia and were able to receive the care she needed.

When Tori was two and a half, we experienced our second miracle that preserved her life.  We had just moved to Florida and were enjoying a ward activity on the beach.  Tori was playing in the sand at the water’s edge, splashing and exploring with sheer toddler glee.  The tide was strange that day, making the water knee deep for the first 30 yards or so.  She was wearing a swimsuit with a built-in flotation device, and seemed content to look for shells in the sand.  I got caught up in conversation and was talking to a sister in the ward when I heard a voice prompt urgently, “turn around right now!”  I was surprised, since I usually do not receive revelation in such an obvious manner.  I spun around and saw Tori, all the way out where the water began to get deep.  With each wave, water was crashing over her head and she was gasping for air.  I began running, but getting through the water felt agonizingly slow.  When I was still about twenty feet from reaching her, I watched helplessly as she went completely under.  I could see her eyes wide with terror, her mouth opening and closing in a desperate attempt to find air.  I fought my way madly across the remaining distance, snatched her out of the water and pounded her back as she coughed up mouthfuls of ocean.  Exhausted, she immediately fell asleep on my shoulder.  I carried her back to shore, sobbing and not willing to let anyone take her from my arms for a long time.  As she slept, all I could do was pray a prayer of gratitude repeatedly as I shook with the knowledge that I would have lost her had I not received that prompting.

Tori is not my only child to be saved by the tender mercies of the Lord.  I was with the kids and Mom and Dad at Yellowstone when we stopped at Artist Point.  The cliffs surrounding the waterfall are beautifully sheer and rugged.  Dangerously so.  The bars of the safety rails are spread far apart…not much of a deterrent for a three-year-old.  I was holding Aaron’s hand tightly, trying to take a picture of the beautiful falls with my free hand.  I let go of his hand for just a moment to adjust a setting on my camera, and he bolted.  I looked up in horror to see that he had already darted under the fence and was less than two feet away from a sheer drop off.  In between him and the ledge, a large root protruded from the ground.  One wrong step and he would trip and go over the edge.  I knelt calmly next to the railing and smiled at him, quietly asking him to come hold my outstretched hand.  Expecting more of a chase, he seemed to deflate, and came right over to me.  As soon as his hand was in mine, I began to shake.  As I held him tightly, I realized what a miraculous blessing it had been that I had stayed calm.  I’m not a naturally “calm” person, and to remain so in that situation was truly divine intervention.  I have no doubt that had I screamed or yelled he would have thought that it was a game and turned and ran – right off that cliff.  That night as I prayed, the only thing I could say was, “Thank-you” over and over again.  I was too shaken to form any other words.

My children are true miracles and blessings in my life.  It scares me at times, the immense love I feel for them.  I know, however, that as much as I love them, my Heavenly Father loves them infinitely more.  He is with me in this journey of raising and teaching them, and makes up for my shortcomings as a mother on a daily basis.  I am thankful for all of His mercies in helping them to become incredible children in spite of my weaknesses and especially for preserving their safety and even their lives on multiple occasions.

Nephite Sheath Dress

Just had to do a quick post about life in the real world of parenting. Tori has an Activity Days production where she has to dress up like a Nephite, and my friend Tanya Smith and I decided to tackle the sewing project together, thinking that surely it couldn't be too difficult to make a simple dress with a sash around the waist.  I look at all of the creative things that other mothers seem to whip out, and I thought that I could at least handle this, right??  After an afternoon of work, this is what we came up with:

Yes, apparently the Nephites wore sheath dresses.  Isn't it lovely??  I'm thinking we can save it for Senior Prom.  Just by her face, you can tell she'd love that!

So I took the leftover sheet and threw it over her, cut a hole for the head and wrapped the sash around her waist.



It's still no work of art, but she seems happier with it and at least she can walk in this one!  I'm probably going to raid Mom's scraps for some fabric in a contrasting color so you can at least see the sash.  Real life, people.  I'm telling you, it's not always perfect.  But it works!

Pancakes and Plays

Well, our cooking classes have been hampered by our oven/range drama.  Ours decided to give up the ghost a couple of months ago while Chewie was finishing up bottling some grape juice.  We ordered a brand new, beautiful stove/oven for Mom and Dad and were so excited for it to arrive.  Unfortunately, it took a few weeks to get it.  In the meantime, we got pretty creative with what you can cook on an electric griddle, in a crock pot, or on an ancient single electric hot plate with a less-than-stellar track record.  Needless to say, when the new unit arrived, we were so excited that it inspired a culinary frenzy as well as the idea for the weekly cooking class with Tori.  

After baking our seven pies for Thanksgiving (made so much easier by the beautiful double oven), the unit rebelled.  Maybe it decided that life in the Demars household was just going to be more than it could handle. Can anyone blame the poor thing?  Seven pies IS kind of a grueling initiation.  Whatever the reason, it decided to stop working, giving us a cryptic error code that stumped customer service representatives wherever we called.  Finally we got someone to come out and look at it, but we are now waiting for a part to come in that they are "pretty sure" is the problem, and we are, again, without a stove or oven.  This is enough to make me grumpy anytime, but especially during the Christmas season, when making goodies is my favorite thing to do.  My hips will probably thank me for it and make New Year's resolutions more obtainable, though, I'm sure!

So for our cooking class this week we were a little limited.  I woke up on Saturday morning craving pancakes.  My poor kids are usually deprived of anything other than cold cereal, toast, or a banana for breakfast, so I decided that since Saturdays are the only day we ever really have time for a hot breakfast, that pancakes would be a great cooking lesson.  And if we're going to have pancakes, why not do it right and make delicious Cinnamon Swirl Pancakes with Cream Cheese Drizzle that I'd seen floating around on Pinterest?  We did, and they came out to be so yummy!  Pancake meets Cinnabon.  YUM.  (recipe at bottom of the post)

Mmmm...cinnamony, buttery goodness!

Aaron thoroughly enjoyed the fruits of this particular cooking class. :) 

After munching on these and cleaning up, I got the kids ready and took them to see David, Tess, and Kimball perform in their stake's production of "Annie" while Todd stayed home and continued prepping for finals.  I had never seen Annie, and the kids and I really enjoyed it.  It was long (almost three hours), and I was surprised that it held Aaron's (or my) attention for that long.  We met up with Jenna, Eli, and Jaylee at the play and got to spend some time with them as well.  

 

Here's a picture that my wonderful friend Tanya Smith (Http://www.tanyasmith.net) took of Annie with the orphans behind her.  My adorable niece Tess is just to the right of the dog.  Isn't she stinkin' cute??  The kids did a great job!

Other than Annie and the pancakes, it's been a pretty quiet week.  I was able to go back to work on Thursday with Julie, which was great.  As part of our day, we were gathering things to include in her Christmas packages, we stopped in at a candy shop at Coeur d' Alene.  We know the owners of the shop, and our conversation quickly turned toward Christ and faith.  We ended up talking to them for about an hour, much of that time spent bearing testimony of different gospel principles.  I truly felt like Julie and I were sister missionaries, and it was a powerful experience that I won't soon forget.

To finish off, here are some funny kid moments of the week and the recipe for the Cinnamon deliciousness:

Todd: Aaron?
Aaron: What?
Todd: Hi.
Aaron: Really? That's all you got?
Me: (laughs hysterically for about ten minutes)


On Monday, Tori gave us a beautiful FHE lesson using the felt nativity scene we made last week.  She did a great job asking Aaron questions along the way to keep him involved and make sure he was following along.  After telling us about the wise men and their gifts, she turned to Aaron and asked, "Aaron, what did the wise men bring baby Jesus?" He thought for a minute and answered proudly, "gold, frankincense, and murder." 

Cinnamon Swirl Pancakes with Cream Cheese Drizzle

Pancakes:
4 cups Krusteaz Buttermilk Pancake mix (I was going to make homemade, but this worked well)
about 2 3/4 cups water, until the batter is the proper consistency

Cinnamon Filling:
1/2 c. butter, softened
3/4 c. packed brown sugar
1 T. cinnamon

Cream Cheese Drizzle:
6 T. butter
4 oz. cream cheese
1/2 c. powdered sugar (add slowly until it tastes yummy)
1/2 t. vanilla

-Beat the cinnamon filling ingredients together until well combined.  Spoon into a zip-lock bag and set aside.
-Beat the cream cheese drizzle ingredients together until well combined.  Spoon into another zip-lock bag and set aside.
-Prepare pancake batter and heat a griddle to 375 degrees.  Snip one corner from each of the zip-lock bags.  
-Grease the griddle (I used butter) and pour batter onto griddle using a 1/4 c. measuring cup.  As soon as you pour it, use the bag to pipe a cinnamon spiral onto each of the pancakes.
-Flip the pancakes when they are bubbly on the top and the bottoms are golden brown.  Cook until the second side is golden.
-Remove pancakes to a plate and top each with the cream cheese mixture.  Mine was a bit thick, so I squeezed some on each pancake and spread it with a butter knife.
-Serve with a big glass of cold milk and prepare yourself for a sugar headache! :)  Completely worth it!