Bread

Again. Today I baked my fourth loaf, a cheese-salsa "last minute loaf" from a recipe in the booklet that came with the Cuisinart bread machine (shown at left, possibly 5-10 years old, on loan to me for an unspecified period). Of the four loaves, only one failed, and even it was edible: the excessive dryness and hardness may have been due to my misinterpretation of the cycle instructions in a recipe from a different book, which was not specifically for a Cuisinart machine, and used different names for the cycles. The other three have been, IMNSHO, very satisfactory; it is almost as if the machine takes the guesswork out of the difficult aspects of bread-baking. Today's loaf has the distinction of being the first one that met with Stella's full approval. It's not that she has high standards from years of baking (though she probably did that in her younger years), but from her general lack of interest in bread as food. This one, I'm happy to say, caught her attention! And yes, of course, I bookmarked the recipe.

I am surprised and delighted how pleasurable it is to dine on bread one has baked oneself. I know that using a bread machine is "cheating," but there's something about the aroma of the ingredients, both during preparation and of course during and after baking, that simply cannot be topped for sheer pleasure. And after this past week's sour experience, I can certainly stand some sheer pleasure!