Baking Bread

For some reason, within my 29 years of living, I've never made bread from scratch. Well, I have now!

I acquired a baking book by Emma Patmore. It's an excellent book, with easy to follow instructions. I made the Garlic Rolls, I've been coveting the Garlic & Sage Bread but thought I'd leave that for now.

How to make the Garlic Rolls:

Ingredients -

12 cloves of garlic (I used 14 and it hardly seemed garlicky, but I love garlic, so?)

350ml / 12 floz milk

450g / 1lb Strong White Bread Flour

1 tsp Salt

1 Sachet of Dried Yeast (She recommends Easy Blend, I used Fast Acting)

1 tbsp Dried Mixed Herbs (I didn't use any, I used a handful of Fresh Chives)

2 tbsp Sunflower Oil (I used Vegetable Oil, what can I say, I'm not good at following recipes)

1 beaten Egg

Due to not being very good at following recipes (and not owning a blender, I've adapted some of the instructions).

Right, peel and chop the Garlic Cloves up really small, boil and simmer in the Milk for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, mix together the Flour, Salt & Yeast.

When the garlicky Milk has cooled, add the Oil and Egg, pour gradually into the Flour while mixing.

I found that my mixture was gunky and wet, so threw lots of flour on the side when beating, which helped dry it up.

Beat up (knead) the dough for a little while on a floured side, and then leave for one hour, in a greased container, covered by a cloth.

Once it's expanded to twice the size or larger, beat it up for a couple of minutes and then separate into eight different rolls, or more if you want small ones (I'm tempted to insert some garlic butter next time).

Place on a greased baking tray, score the tops of the rolls, dip in Milk (or brush some Milk on the top, if you own a fancy basting brush), sprinkle some Rock Salt, or grated Garlic on top, or cheese?

Put into a pre-heated oven at 220c/425f/Gas Mark 7 for 15-20 minutes.

Et Voila - tasty rolls!