Children can love tucking into good, tasty bread. Nowadays, though, unless you are lucky, the only way of getting quality bread at a reasonable price is to bake your own.
Most shop bread is now made by standard industrial methods involving a raft of additives and so much salt that bread is now one of the saltiest foods on sale. It has none of the taste, smell or texture of the real thing.
Some nurseries bake bread as a routine, sometimes with the children helping. Mixing dough and shaping little rolls can be fun, and what a touch of magic there is when the dough rises and when golden brown rolls come out of the oven!
- White or wholemeal?
White bread is easy and quick to eat and so provides a rapid source of energy. Many children know no other kind. But the refining process causes losses of vital nutrients. Also, as so little fibre is left, the white starch compacts in the gut, causing constipation, now widespread among children, especially if few other fibre-rich foods are eaten. In time it can cause serious problems of the digestive system.
However, wholemeal bread is bulky in the stomach and may leave children short of calories. One answer to this is to provide nutritious between-meal snacks; another is to mix wholemeal and white bread. A third answer is to use 'brown' (81 per cent extraction) flour in all cooking including, if possible, the nursery's bread. Brown flour is only partly refined, so makes a good compromise between wholemeal and white flour.
- Quick-and-easy bread
This makes delicious bread. Use 'brown' flour or 50-50 white and wholemeal.
INGREDIENTS
For 1 small (400g/1 lb) loaf:
350g (12oz) plain flour; 1 1/2 tsp salt; 2tsp black treacle; 15g (1 1/2oz) fresh yeast or 7g dried; 210-260ml (7-9floz) water, half hot, half cold
Step by step
- In jug, stir the treacle in the hot water. Add the cold water, then stir in the yeast. Cover, and put in a warm place to bubble.
- Mix the flour and salt in a large bowl, and oil a bread tin.
- Pour the bubbling yeast mixture on to the flour and mix in, first with a spoon, then with the hands. The dough must be soft and easy to mix. If it feels dry, quickly add more water.
- Enclose the bowl in a clear plastic bag and put it somewhere warm.
- When the dough has doubled in size, punch it back with your fist, then tip it on to a lightly floured surface.
- Knead for a minute to make smooth, then push it into the loaf tin so it touches all four sides.
- Enclose in the plastic bag, ballooning the bag up over the tin to avoid the rising dough sticking to it. Put to rise.
- Heat the oven to 210 degsC, gas mark 7 and have a shelf ready in the centre of the oven. When the dough has risen to just above the top of the tin, bake it for 23 minutes.
- Tip the loaf out of the tin, then put it back in the oven upside down for a few minutes to finish the bottom crust.
- Test. If it's done, cool it on a rack or across the tin. Eat only when the bread is quite cold or it will cause indigestion. Loaves can take hours to cool, so it's usually best to have it the next day.
To make rolls: Place 5-6 balls on a greased baking tray. Put to rise as above, enclosing the tray in a large plastic bag. Bake at 210 degsC, gas mark 7 for 13-15 minutes. Test and cool.
For a large (800g/2lb) loaf: 475g (1 lb 1oz) flour, 1 1/2tsp salt, 2tsps treacle, 25g (1 oz) fresh yeast/15g dried, and about 350ml (12fl oz) water.
For extra quick bread, omit the first rising. The bread will be almost as good!
Essential bread making tips
- The water must be tepid. Water that is too warm will kill yeast.
- It's crucial to keep the dough soft and pillowy right from the start. Even slightly dry dough won't mix or rise well and the bread will be solid. The dough should be soft enough to billow out between your fingers. If in doubt, add more water.
- Undercooked bread is doughy and highly indigestible, so test it thus: Hold the loaf upside down in one oven-gloved hand and rap it gently with the knuckles of your other hand. If you hear a distinct hollow, knocking sound, the loaf is done. If in doubt, bake a few more minutes. Overdone is better than underdone.
- If you are baking several loaves, use one shelf only, unless you've a fan-oven.
Make full use of bread
- Serve a variety of breads such as nan, chappatis, baguettes, pitta, both wholemeal and white.
- Let children compile their own sandwiches.
- Plan teatime menus around 'bread-and-something'.
- Spread toast with: hummus, scrambled egg, mashed sardines, tuna beaten into curd cheese, cheese and tomato, thick tomato sauce, or nursery 'garlic bread': olive oil mixed with crushed garlic and lemon juice
- Drop toast cubes into soups and stews.
- Make stale bread into breadcrumbs for toppings, bread and butter pudding, summer pudding.
CHIEF NUTRIENTS IN AVERAGE BREAD PER 100G
Sliced white wholemeal brown
Calcium 100mg 54mg 100mg
Iron 1.4mg 2.7mg 2.2mg
Zinc 0.5mg 1.8mg 1.1mg
Magnesium 20mg 76mg 53mg
Copper 0.13mg 0.26mg 0.16mg
B1 0.20mg 0.34mg 0.27mg
B2 0.05mg 0.09mg 0.09mg
E trace 0.20mg trace
Folate 17mcg 39mcg 40mcg
Fibre 1.5g 5.8g 3.5g
Calories 926kJ 914kJ 927kJ
Source: The Composition of Foods; MacCance and Widdowson.
By law, vitamins B1, B2, iron and calcium (as calcium carbonate: chalk)
are added to white bread, but it is not certain how well these are
absorbed.