Monday Message

"Our Heavenly Father created this beautiful earth, with all its abundance, for our benefit and use. His purpose is to provide for our needs as we walk in faith and obedience. He has lovingly commanded us to ‘prepare every needful thing’ (see D&C 109:8) so that, should adversity come, we may care for ourselves and our neighbors, and support bishops as they care for others." (All is Safely Gathered In pamphlet)

I am so thankful for this beautiful earth.

Preparing every needful thing is a big job, but do it a little at a time. Just ponder what is needed and then make a plan and work that plan. It does not need to be done all at once. Whenever I have a huge task, I break it down and do a little each day. Otherwise I would feel very overwhelmed. Sometimes I will give myself a time limit, let's say twenty minutes. If I am making headway, I may choose to go longer, and I often do, but it doesn't seem so hard when I say twenty minutes.

This week was time to make up bread mixes. I filled all these jars. This is the recipe I share for bread machine but you can do it by hand as well. Yes, I did do it by hand to see and it works just as well.

I put 3 cups of regular flour (cause that is what I have). So each jar gets the three cups of flour.

Then I add 3 tsp. of vital wheat gluten (if you use bread flour you can omit this).

I then add a handful of oatmeal.

Then a 1 tsp. salt

2 Tbsp. sugar

2 1/2 tsp. yeast

I just take a butter knife and give a little stir so the yeast isn't on top.

Then I put 2 Tbsp. shortening on the top and put on my jar lid and ring. 

When I use the mix, I put 1 1/4 cup of warm water into the pan of my bread machine and dump one of these jars in on top then put it on the dough setting.

When it gets to the top of the pan (usually an hour or an hour and a half - depends on any given day but I check at an hour), I take it out and either make the loaf by spraying slightly the table then pat it as wide as my bread pan and a little longer the other way, then I roll it into the bread log and put it into the sprayed loaf pan. I spray the top and cover loosely with plastic wrap. I set my oven to preheat 350 degrees and let the loaf rise one inch above the rim of the pan - little more is okay, mind you set a timer. This takes me thirty minutes then I put it in the oven and bake for forty minutes.

I let it cool for thirty minutes or so then use an electric knife to slice it. The reason I like to have it all sliced at once is that it’s convenient and makes better slices.

Sometimes I make cinnamon rolls or pecan rolls...

This is a basic dough that you can make anything you can come up with just by changing it a little. There are many variations in this cookbook generously made and shared by my friend Liza.

It is the base and then you can go from there. So I make up these "bread kits" to make it fast when I need to make a bread item.

This week I tried it as bread bowls. I covered a cookie sheet with foil then I got out four bowls that could go in the oven. I sprayed them and divided the dough. I used two large and two regular sized bowls but if you have four the same size, divide it evenly. I just pressed the dough around the bowls. So it looks like this.

Then I sprayed and covered it with plastic wrap loosely. I let it rise fifteen to twenty minutes. Then baked in a 350 degree oven till it was nicely golden.

So now that adds another variation with this bread dough.

I also did some weaving. I took these two balls of pearled cotton and just did a tabby weave.

I thought I would just play with this warp I have on the loom at this time.

Gus and Missy besides overseeing my pattern I am working on, remind you to please be safe - we are not yet out of the pandemic. Continue to wear your masks and wash your paws and social distance like they are demonstrating for you.