Why I Bake

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It goes back to Black Eagle, Montana and Grandma Tuss in the late 1940's. There was nothing in my young world better than the aroma of her fresh baked bread, other than the bread itself.

The childhood memories of those happy times in grandma’s kitchen never left me. To this day, the aroma of fresh baked bread still triggers those memories. Grandma would bake several times a week, probably because so many of her grandkids and their parents lived within walking distance. 

She also made her own pasta, ravioli, and other ‘old country” Croation dishes. Her nut roll, or povitica, was fantastic. I have her recipe and have made it many times. The first time I made it, it was like she was looking over my shoulder and helping me. The povitica turned out great. Her recipe makes seven or eight nut rolls and with all the relatives around I understand why. My first batch of eight disappeared in three days. My siblings and my mom, who once made her own fantastic povitica, gobbled it all up. Mom said, “Grandma Tuss would be proud of you.”  I hoped so.

I baked some puff pastry “Roses” many years ago. Thinly sliced red apples wrapped in pastry and done right, come out of the oven looking like roses. They turned out fairly well. But some of my other attempts at baking were simply disasters. It wasn’t that I was intimidated, or afraid to try, it was simply the fact that I didn’t know what I was doing. Yes, I could follow a recipe, but I couldn’t bake!

The goal was to try and duplicate grandma’s bread. They were usually made with white flour but occasionally she would throw in some wheat flour. I just remember her tossing ingredients into a big bowl, stirring it all up and kneading for 10 minutes. Covered with a damp towel, it rose for an hour or two, and if I was lucky, I got to punch it down. After the second rise, we’d punch it down again and form it into loaf pans. They were ready to go into the oven when the bread rose to the rim of the pan. Once in the oven, the magic began. The aroma drew everybody closer to the oven as the bread rose and browned. The butter and homemade jams came out of the fridge and the bread knife was at the ready. 

It was never a disappointment! 

What I didn’t realize until I started to bake bread, was that she had years of dough experience that told her exactly what the dough needed to make it behave like she wanted. By feel, she would know to add more water or flour or just give it more time. A recipe cannot teach you that aspect of baking, but a keen interest and determination might. I certainly had both but found out that wasn’t enough.

After baking regularly for over 8 years and reading at least a dozen “how to” bread books, I am still searching for that perfect loaf. I realize now that the pure pleasure grandma got from watching her fresh baked bread disappear into a bunch of happy, smiling faces, was the reason she baked. And so, it is the reason I bake too.