Baked Babka!

Terry baked some fresh babka today. I helped a little when she went down to church. She did all the hard work including making sure I understood what I had to do. (Punch it down one more time. Let it raise again for 45 minutes and put it in the oven at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got it. What did you say?") It was still baking when she got back so it was her responsibility to take it out of the oven.

Baked Babka

This is the first time we have successfully had a bread rise properly. Normally the house is so cool that the yeast just won't do what it's supposed to do and we end up with something that's very,very dense. Like dwarf battle bread dense. I made sourdough one time that I could have used as a discus in the Greek tradition. Or driven a nail with the flat sides. Even the birds and squirrels passed it up. Probably didn't want a bent beak or a chipped tooth.

This time Terry put the dough in the microwave with two cups of warm water and the yeast did its thing the way it was supposed to do it. (We had tried the "heat the oven and then turn it off" trick once. Didn't work.) It didn't hurt that the house was a toasty 68-70 degrees.

I may just have to start a batch of sourdough again.

Unfortunately, I have to wait until after she gets the Easter food blessed tomorrow at noon. (Unless I can realy, really fake sleep walking....)