Simply Delicious White Bread

In the spirit of Gerald of Wales (see especially his treatise on Ireland), I hope make this blog as great a wealth of knowledge as possible.

And for that reason, have decided that today is the most auspicious day to post my first recipe. (Not of course counting this).

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Simply Delicious White Bread
Although I haven't made it in a while, this is one of my fall back recipes. Made famous by its weekly appearance at Stebbins dinners during my tenure as a cook. This really is a co-op sized recipe, so feel free to cut it in half.

Ingredients:
5 c. warm water
2 T. dry yeast (or 2 packages active dry yeast)
4 T. sugar
2 T. salt
14 c. (white) flour, preferably unbleached!
1 egg white to glaze (optional)

MAKES 4 LOAVES.

Instruction:
Pour 5 c. warm (not boiling!)* water in a large bowl and sprinkle the yeast on top. Allow the yeast to proof (turn frothy) and stir in the sugar and salt.
Add 14 cups of white flour to the water mixture.
Knead for about 10 minutes until it makes a nice soft dough.
Raise till doubled in size.
Punch down, knead 3 or 4 times to remove air. Cut the dough into 4 pieces and shape into loaves.
Place dough in greased loaf tins (good for sandwiches). -OR- Place dough on a greased baking sheet and slash the loaves three times.
Brush loaves with egg** and allow to rise. Now is a good time to preheat your oven.
When loaves have roughly doubled in size, bake for 15 minutes at 450ºF and for 30 minutes more at 350ºF.***
Allow loaves to cool and freeze any loaves you're not going to eat right away. (Wrap frozen loaves in foil).
Enjoy!

*If your water's too hot you'll kill the yeast.
**The egg glaze makes it a lot easier to tell when the bread is done because it will turn a nice golden color, whereas unglazed loaves stay a floury white.
***Baking at 450ºF first gives it a nice thick crust. If you don't like crusty bread, you can bake it at 350ºF the whole way through.

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