When I was growing up in the 50s and 60s we never ate store bread. My mother, her mother, and my dad's mother all baked their own bread. And everyone's bread was different. My dad's mother made compact loaves with a firm crumb, but not dense. She sliced it really thin. My other grandma's bread was big, puffy loaves with a soft crumb and pale outside crust - it was what I think of as 'bready.'

My mother's loaves were large, looming large over the tops of the pans, with a nice brown crust. The inside was soft, but not too soft. She made 30 loaves at a time and froze them. My dad always insisted on having hard, cold butter that would go on in chunks and sometimes tear the bread. It was one of those little things that if he didn't get what he wanted was an excuse to throw a tantrum.

My bread looks a lot like my mother's. I buy special large plastic bags for it because it doesn't fit in gallon bags. I only make two loaves at a time. One thing I learned from my mother was when you are increasing or decreasing a recipe, always write out your new amounts. How many times have you been making half a batch of biscuits and then realized you just put in the full amount of baking powder, so have to make a whole batch?



(Shown with chunky butter.)

Like many prolific bakers, my mother gave away a lot of her bread, and I remember the time Madge Helm asked for the recipe. My mother gave it to her but left out the milk and egg that made her bread different from other recipes. The vinegar is my own recent addition. I saw it in a church lady recipe book - Recipes from Madison County - and think it enhances the rising properties of the dough. All the risings help develop the flavor. I usually do two in the bowl and one in the pan.

Here is my mother's recipe.

Louise's White Bread

3 cups milk, scalded
3 tablespoons shortening
1/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons salt
1 egg
1 Tablespoon vinegar
2 packages yeast
1 cup lukewarm water
6 1/2 cups flour

Add sugar, salt and shortening to scalded milk and set aside to cool to lukewarm. Dissolve yeast and 1 teaspoon sugar in 1 cup lukewarm water. Mix like bread. Let rise twice before shaping into loaves, and let rise twice in the pans. Shape by patting the dough into a rectangle and folding it in thirds like a wash cloth, or roll up in a spiral, sealing the edge by pinching it.

Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes and turn the oven down to 350 degrees for 15 minutes. When you take them out of the oven, brush the tops with butter - half peel the paper off a stick and apply.


Every Saturday my mother served homemade chili made from beef and pinto beans raised on our farm. Sometimes she'd be thawing the brick of chili in a pan on the stove while a frozen loaf of bread was trying to thaw in the oven. It's hard to thaw a stick of frozen butter without melting it or ending up with soft butter.

Here is my sister's chili recipe, which is a lot like my mother's.

Marg's Chili

1 pound ground beef
Chopped onion
1 can tomato paste
2 cups cooked beans
2 tablespoons vinegar or 1/2 can beer
Beef base
Cumin
Garlic powder
Chili powder
Paprika
Oregano
Basil
Bay leaf

Brown your ground beef with the onion. Stir in the rest of the ingredients and simmer a long time. Amounts? Just wing it.

Note from Louise on the card: For a 5 pound block of meat it takes around 1/2 cup chili powder. Use the kind with seeds and coarse ground.