Branching Out

Yesterday, Emily asked if she could bake brownies.  Baking is a favorite past time and the girls are really good at it, but we end up with lots of sweets that either get eaten, or get thrown away - neither option is one I feel good about.


In an effort to find a healthier balance, (learn to make something more than sweets, make something healthier, make something we need.) I suggested she make dinner or bake bread.  Before thinking too much, she picked bread (in her mind it was too early to work on dinner), and asked to use a recipe I made twice last week.


The recipe is for basic white bread and is in the 3-ring Pillsbury cookbook. It's pretty simple in that it doesn't use milk or eggs.  I handed her the cookbook and told her to get me if she needed help.  I really want the girls to know how to read and follow a recipe - which they've shown great ability to do when making treats - to trust the words on the page, follow the instructions and be proud of the final product.  She did an awesome job.  And I only stepped in a couple of times to show her how to do something ... proper kneading technique and how to divide the dough into loaves and shape a loaf.

Making bread took a lot longer than she expected - they went in the oven at 9pm, but the end product is something she is really proud of, and it made an awesome breakfast (with some of last weeks blackberry jam - yum!) everyone enjoyed ... she's saving the second loaf for tomorrow morning!

I'm hoping we can do this more this summer ... help to curb boredom by learning to make food our family needs on a daily/weekly basis.