Things Neniell Made: Snow White Bread

First of all, my bread did not turn out white. It was a sort of yellowish color. That might be because I decided to use butter instead of shortening because butter just seems like a better option! Also, I scaled down this recipe. The original made 6 loaves of bread which is way too much for me! Here is one of the lovely loaves and a few slices.

This bread is good, but it strangely had a slight taste of a cake style donut. I don't think I'll use it again. It's a bit too sweet for just plain white bread. The recipe is almost identical to the first white bread that I made, so I'm not sure why the taste is so different. For the next white bread I make, I'm going to use the first recipe and change the 2 cups of milk to 1 cup milk and 1 cup water. It might cut down on the sweetness a bit. We shall see.

Snow White Bread (Printer friendly PDF version)

1 packet active dry yeast

1/4 C warm water

2 C milk, scalded

2 T sugar

2 t salt

1 T butter (or shortening)

6 C flour, sifted

Proof the yeast in the 1/4 C warm water. Add 1/4 t sugar if desired to feed the yeast during the proofing process.

Scald the milk. Meanwhile, place the sugar, salt, and butter in a bowl.

Pour the scalded milk into the bowl and stir. Let cool to lukewarm.

Once cooled, add the yeast and 2 cups of flour. Mix together with a spoon.

Slowly mix in more flour until you get a slightly sticky dough. You will most likely have to use your hands near the end of the flour adding process.

Plop the dough on a clean surface and knead. (As mentioned before, I use the "lift, flip, smack down, stretch out, and fold over" method. See the sweet dough recipe for more info!)

Once kneaded, lightly coat the dough ball with flour. Place the dough ball in a lightly floured bowl and cover with a non-fuzzy cloth. Let rise for an hour or until doubled in size.

Punch down the dough. I do this by removing the dough from the bowl and placing it on the clean surface. I then press it down all over with my finger tips. Fold it and repeat until you get a ball shape again. Return the punched down dough to the bowl, recover, and let rise again until doubled (about an hour).

Remove the dough from the bowl and split it into two pieces. Let these pieces rest for 10 minutes before shaping into loaves and placing in lightly greased loaf pans.

Cover the loaf pans with a non-fuzzy towel and let rise until doubled again.

At this point, I decided to make a slit in the top of the dough and brush them with a lot of butter. The slit in the top made prevented the loaf from rounding much, but nothing else.