French Herb Bread

I found this recipe on the back of my bread flour.  It’s really good, after messing around with it a little this is what I came up with.

The Recipe

1 TBS. of yeast

2 TBS. of sugar

1 tsp. of salt

4 cups of bread flour

1/4 of butter or margarine

1 cup of milk

1/4 cup of water

1 TBS. vinegar

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Sauté these ingredients together in a pan and let cool.

1/2 cup of minced onion

1 clove of garlic minced

1/2 salt

1 TBS. minced parsley (I used 1 TBS of dried parsley)

2 TBS of butter or margarine

The Directions

Combine yeast, sugar, salt, and flour in a large bowl.  In a separate microwavable bowl ( I used my 2 cup glass measuring cup)  melt the 1/4 cup of butter. To the melted butter add the milk and water, return to the microwave for 30 seconds. Add the milk mixture, vinegar and sautéed mixture to the flour mixture.  Mix until well incorporated, and dough is smooth and elastic.  Let dough rise until it doubles in size. Punch the dough down and roll the dough out flat on a floured surface.  Roll the dough back up to form a loaf (like cinnamon rolls).  Cut into two loafs and let rise again until they double.  Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. Brush hot bread with melted butter.

The original recipe had you spread the butter and sauté mixture into the middle of the loaf and then roll it up.  So you could do it like that.  BUT no matter how you make the dough you should still roll the dough out and roll it back up to form a loaf.  They come out prettier that way.

We made ours into pizza bread.  Which I would totally recommend, the herb flavors of the bread went really well with the pizza toppings.  It was delicious.

Enjoy!!

FYI - it’s not your typical crusty french bread, it’s pretty soft, but still it’s worth a try.