Well Bread

Earlier this week, Audrey followed all of the steps to bake her first-ever challah. There turns out to be a range of steps that involve activating yeast, mixing together dry and wet ingredients, adding in the yeast, waiting for the dough to rise, and letting it rise some more. Then separating and rolling and braiding and baking and cooling, and then waiting for far too long to taste the product that is giving off a heavenly smell that fills the kitchen. The process took most of an afternoon. But, given that we are sheltering in place for the Pandemic, most of our afternoons are pretty free these days. And, given, the wonderful taste of the bread when I finally got to sample it, the afternoon was well spent.

the challah in all its tasty beauty

Step by step

Audrey would probably note that all I did to help create the challah was cheer her on and take photographs to post on Facebook. But those are important parts of my role as family documentarian, even if I am self-appointed.

The real product of the bread-making venture was the challah that emerged, of course. It was large and beautiful and remarkably tasty. But I think the real story was the yeast that was at the heart of the process. There is something magical about yeast. “It’s alive!” – to quote an old horror film. And these days, it is pretty hard to come by.

When Audrey first came up with the notion of baking a challah, Amanda volunteered to pick up the ingredients. Amanda has become our designated shopper during our Pandemic home stand. She reasons that her parents are in that age group considered more vulnerable. And we accept that concept, as long as she doesn’t call us “old.”

Returning from her shopping trip, Amanda reported several key failures. The store was out of both all-purpose flour and yeast. There must be a lot of bread making going on during these home-bound days. So Audrey went out on her own the next day to our small but very convenient local market. She waited outside the store, wearing her face mask and standing at a safe distance from other customers, until she was allowed to enter and shop.  Right away, she found one of the last bags of all-purpose flour on the shelf.  But no yeast!  She sought out an employee to ask about the missing ingredient and was encouraged to learn that the store did have a supply of yeast, but it was being kept (preserved?) in a storeroom to discourage hoarding.

A novice at yeast buying and knowing that the recipe called for two packets of yeast, Audrey asked for two packages. “I can only let you have one,” the employee said. “That’s the limit.”

Luckily, the employee explained that each yeast package contains three packets of yeast to use for baking. So Audrey could now make her challah and have an extra packet of yeast left over to use for some other baked delicacy. The challah project was now a go! And it was also a big success. I can say that after consuming several open-face challah sandwiches and making plans for French toast on the weekend.

Audrey’s yeast adventure reminds me of children’s book that I wrote in the mid-1980s for World Book, the encyclopedia people. My book was part of a young readers’ set of books and cassette tapes (which shows how long ago this was). My book, being written to help preschoolers recognize words beginning with the letters B and S and understand the concepts of big and small, was entitled “Barry’s Big Bread.” 

Barry the Book

and Barry the cassette

Its plot involved a bear named Barry--who loves all things big--trying to bake the biggest bread he could. To do that, he doubled the amount of yeast his recipe called for. His bread dough rose and rose. He kept moving it to larger and larger bowls and then into the largest baking pan in his house. When he tried to put it into the oven, the pan wouldn’t fit and dough spilled all over everything. Barry had made a big mess and was one sorry bear! To make him feel better, his friends helped him clean up the mess and then brought him some small bread, in the form of bagels.

That was the plot I proposed. Now, remember that this was the mid-1980s, and I was pitching my idea to people in the Midwest, and I was the only Jewish guy in the room. The publishing people offered one major criticism. “Very few of our readers will know what a bagel is,” they said. “Barry’s friends will have to bring him a bag of buns.” A bag of buns? Really? I reluctantly accepted the change but did have Barry request the biggest bun in the bag as the story ended.

Times have obviously changed since the mid-1980s, and bagels have developed a universal appeal—even in the Midwest. But I am getting off my subject, which is the big and wonderful challah that Audrey baked thanks to her determination to score a supply of yeast and the magic of the yeast itself.