Artisan Bread, despite myself

Jayme Goffin did a tutorial last week and shared her deeelicious artisan bread recipe. If you go to her blog Tales from the Coop Keeper it's one of the header pictures, the one that looks like it was baked at a fine Parisian bakery. Jayme listed the 4 ingredients and made the recipe step by step. I knew I could do it.

The night before at bedtime I stirred up the ingredients, then yesterday bright and early I logged onto the blog so she could "talk me through it."

That's when I realized I didn't have 3 very important elements for baking the most beautiful artisan bread I've ever seen. I didn't have parchment paper. I have looked at it before at the grocery store but when I saw the price $3.16, I jumped back and ran away fast. I was already knee deep in sticky dough so I had to figure something out, aluminum foil seemed the best substitute.

Next Jayme used a fancy knife that cost $130 to crisscross the bread but I all I had was one of Ron Popeil's Showtime bread knives so I just had to make do.

It's looking good despite the fact that I'm woefully unprepared for bread making. The smell in the kitchen would have brought a grown man to his knees. I wish I'd had one here this morning, I'd have sent him to town for parchment paper.

Jayme keeps saying, "Don't be afraid, it will turn out perfect no matter what you do!" She throws it in the cast iron pot to bake, a bead of sweat is now on the tip of my nose since I realize I don't even have the right pot to bake in. How is this ever going to be remotely like hers?

I plop mine in the heated pot, cover and slip into the hot oven lowering the temperature and whispering a prayer. Thirty short minutes the timer dings and I take off the lid and peer down into the stainless pot that should have been a cast iron Lodge dutch oven.

Fifteen more minutes and it's ready to make it's arrival into the world. It did peel off the foil ok, but it's not perfect like Jayme's bread. It has lumps and bumps and the crisscross is woefully nondescript due to the fact that it was just a cheap Ron Popeil bread knife. I put an ample serving of butter out, hoping to hide the fact that my loaf was a little misshapen and a little too pale. About that time Hubby walked in from work. The first words out of his mouth were, "How did the bread turn out?" He had watched the night before as I stirred it up. He'd evidently been thinking about it all day long.

I had already eaten the end piece and it was better than good, it was delicious. The texture was soft and heavenly, just like a cloud. He grabbed the second slice, buttered it and carried it away with him to the bedroom while he changed. At dinner we had two more slices, warm and buttered it was the main attraction of the meal. We have half a loaf left, two people did quite a bit of damage to this loaf of bread that didn't look perfect, but was.

For complete instructions for this easy to make bread that will improve your marriage, cure cancer and impart world peace...click HERE!