Making your own breads

There’s nothing quite like homemade bread still warm from the oven.  A fresh slice slathered in butter is a treat that can’t be beat.  Even after three years baking my own bread my family can scarcely wait for the loaves to cool enough before cutting into them.

Making your own bread is a rewarding experience.  Not only will you be saving money, but knowing that your family is eating healthy food not contaminated with any harmful preservatives or GMOs holds a special level of satisfaction.  And you can customize your bread to suit the needs and tastes of your family–the possibilities are endless!

Many people are put off by the time and work involved in baking fresh bread–but I maintain that the end-result is worth the effort.  Once you get the hang of making bread the process gets easier and quicker, and it’s possible to cut a few corners if you own a bread making machine that will do most of the work for you (I don’t own one–but I’ve heard they’re a great time-saver!).

Recently I stepped up my efforts to avoid processed foods–particularly any processed food that contains high fructose corn syrup(HFCS) or any other form of genetically modified ingredient.  This means I no longer buy bread, cereal, crackers or other such snack-foods at the mainstream grocery store.  But I had yet to weed out other forms of breads–like burger and hot dog buns.

Until now.  Booyah baby!!!

Here are my first-ever burger buns–sitting next to my fresh oatmeal bread.  I actually made a double batch of buns; one batch made 12 burger buns like the ones you see here, the second batch made 16 hot dog buns.  I had already packaged up the other buns when I thought to take this picture.  In my house, if I don’t put away buns quickly, my boys eat them as snacks–and I’d already lost 3 of these fresh buns–so I packed them up and put them in the freezer for later use.

I found my recipe for burger or hot dog buns at allrecipes.com–one of my favorite recipe sites because the members rate the recipes, so you know up-front the quality of the recipe you are using.  These rolls were airy and fluffy, we had to try them immediately, and so we had some of Kniffin’s natural-casing hot dogs for dinner last night, with green beans and fresh chard I’d picked at mid-day straight from the garden.

The hot dog buns were a little tricky to shape–the instructions on the recipe said to make a rectangle with the dough, then roll it up the long way.  Mine did not stay rolled but quickly unraveled.  So instead I rolled them like you would with kids’ play-doh, making a short and fat “snake”.  Then I set them on a greased cookie sheet about an inch apart from each other and let them rise 20 or 30 minutes before I put them in the oven.  They came out shaped a little irregular, but that did not matter to my family what-so-ever.

The burger buns were easier to shape, I just kneaded each little ball of dough into a flattish circular-type shape, them placed them on the cookie sheet, again about an inch apart from each other.  Most of them came out about the same size and shape.

And there you have it!  Buns to go!  Sure it’s a bit time consuming, but well worth the effort and peace of mind.

What do you think?  Is it worth all this effort to avoid GMOs?  Are you concerned about processed foods at all?  Or is it worth the time saved to spend the money for quick and easy food on the run?