Mommy's White Bread

This is the recipe my mom has used for bread my whole life.  When I was a little girl I was allowed to make it and sell it in my neighborhood to get money for things I wanted to buy. It looks like a lot of work but once you get the hang of it, it's really not, although it is time consuming.  

Ingredients:

3 3/4 cups of milk

1 stick of butter or margarine

4 tbs of granulated sugar

5 tsps of salt

1 bag of white flour

  *You won't use the entire bag, but it will be close after you use flour to powder the table too

2 packets (or 4 tbs) of yeast

1/2 cup warm water

 This recipe yields 4 loaves of bread

Directions:

1) Pour 3 3/4 cups of milk and 1 stick of butter into microwave safe bowl, microwave on high for 5 minutes (you want it warm, but not hot) 

2) In separate (large) bowl, stir 1/2 cup of warm water (about bathwater temp.  The best way to check for me is on my wrist) and 4 tbs (or 2 packets) of yeast in bowl, set aside.

3) In MILK bowl, using a hand mixer, mix in the 5 tsps of salt and 4 tbs of sugar. 

4) Pour the milk mixture into your bowl with the yeast, add about 1/4 of your bag of flour and mix (with hand mixer) for 2 full minutes

5) Add more flour and keep mixing until it's too doughy for your mixer (this is where your bread hooks come in extremely handy), then with clean hands begin mixing in more flour. Once it's solid enough you can dump your dough onto the table and knead it until it's the right consistency.  (Usually it's soft, and you can touch it without sticking to it from the outside, but when you dig into it it's still sticky)

6) Place in bowl with warm wet towel over it and let rise until twice it's original size (it takes 25-40ish minutes for me I think.  I've never really timed it but it's a great opportunity to clean up hahaha <3)

7) Divide dough into 4 equal parts, kneading out the air bubbles and place in loaf pans with a warm wet towel over them and let rise until twice it's size again, once they're set and rising, preheat your oven to 350 degrees

8) Bake in oven until the top of your loaf is golden brown and your house smells incredible. :)

** To make a braided loaf, divide your loaf's worth of dough into 3 equal parts and roll into long even strips.  Connect them at the top by pressing them together, then braid like you would your hair.  Connect them again at the other end, then place on a cookie sheet to bake.  It pulls apart really well, so it's great for dipping into cheese..

Personal Tip:  If you don't have awesome pans, your bread will stick, so I spray crisco baking spray into mine before putting the dough in and the bread falls right out when it's done baking.