Free Recipes

It is impossible to make good bread with poor flour.

Good flour should not be perfectly white in color, but of a creamy, yellowish-white
shade. If it has a damp peel, is sticky, and gradually forms into lumps
or cakes up, it is not of the best quality. Good flour, when squeezed
by the hand, holds together in a mass and retains the impression of the
fingers, and when made into dough it is elastic, easy to be kneaded, will
stay in a round, puffy shape, and will take up a large quantity of water.
Poor flour will be sticky, spread itself over the board, and will never
seem stiff enough to be handled no matter how much flour be used.

• It is extravagant to buy cheap flour
• It is estimated that one barrel of flour will last one person one
  year
• Flour is not improved by long keeping, though many flour dealers will
  tell you differently.

Flour should always be kept in a cool, dry place, as the least dampness
causes it to absorb moisture; the gluten loses its tenacity, and bread
made from it is coarse and heavy.

Wheat is the greatest and most important of all foods. About one hundred
million tons are grown in the world every year, yet a third of this immense
amount is wasted in the milling of white flour. For every pound of wheat
that is milled, a third of a pound is wasted in order to get the flour
white. This third that is wasted contains all the vital elements of the
grain, and for the need of these missing elements millions have suffered
the severest penalty.

Nature has provided in a grain of wheat fifteen important elements that
are needed properly to nourish the human body. There is no sense in removing
ten or twelve of these elements in milling simply to produce a product
that is pleasing to the eye. Food value is what is needed, not color.

The fibrous part of the entire wheat is very important as a laxative
in the food. The outer covering of a grain of wheat is Nature’s remedy
for constipation.

How true it is that vanity sometimes has more to do with the high cost
of living than other conditions.

WATER BREAD

• 2 quarts sifted (new-process) flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 tablespoon butter, or lard
• 2 cup liquid yeast, or, 2 cake compressed yeast, dissolved in 2 cup
  water
• 1 pint lukewarm water

Sift the flour, and fill the measure lightly. Turn it into a large bowl
holding about four quarts. Reserve one cup of flour to add at the last
if needed, and to use on the board. Mix the salt and sugar with the flour;
rub in the shortening until fine, like meal. Mix the yeast with the water.
If compressed yeast is used, dissolve a half of a cake in half a cup of
water. This is in addition to the pint of water to be used in mixing.
Pour the liquid mixture into the center of the flour, mixing it well with
a strong spoon. Scrape the dry flour from the sides and bottom of the
bowl, and turn the mass over and over until no dry flour is left. If too
soft to handle easily, add a little more of the reserved cup of flour.
If too stiff, add more water. Knead for half an hour or until perfectly
smooth. Cover and let it rise until it doubles its bulk. Cut it down,
by bringing a knife up through the dough; let it rise again. Divide into
four parts, then shape into loaves, putting two in each pan, or reserve
some for biscuit. Cover and let it rise again to the top of the pan. Bake
in a hot oven for nearly an hour.

MILK BREAD

• 1 pint milk, scalded and cooled
• 1 tablespoon butter, melted in the hot milk
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup yeast
• 6 or 7 cups flour

Measure the milk after scalding, and put it in the mixing bowl; add
the butter, sugar, and salt. When cool, add the yeast, and then stir in
the flour, adding it gradually after five cups are in, that it may not
be too stiff. Use just enough to knead it. Knead until smooth and elastic.
Cover; let it rise till light; cut it down; divide into four parts; shape
into loaves or biscuit. Let it rise again in the pans. Bake forty or fifty
minutes.

PARKER HOUSE ROLLS

• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 yeast cake
• 1 pint boiling milk
• 1 tablespoon lard

Put in a bowl and thicken as thick as griddle cakes. Do this early in
the morning and let be until noon, then stiffen with flour and let rise
until four or five o’clock. Then knead and roll out about a half-inch
thick and spread with warm butter. Then cut in cakes and let rise another
hour. Bake.