Have you seen Clara of Depression Coooking with Clara on the news lately? She is 93 years old and has her own blog and several videos on youtube. With the downturn of the economy, people are very interested in being frugal. Clara shares recipes and stories from her own life during the Great Depression.
I watched her youtube video on making bread. I’ve altered it a bit, but not much. Clara says she uses 5 lbs of flour, 2 oz. of cake yeast and water.
Here’s what I used:
5 lbs. of flour – yes, the whole bag
yeast – I used 7 Tbs, but I think I could have gotten by with less. Maybe 4-5 Tbs.
salt – I used 8 tsp., thinking I would need about 1 tsp. per loaf. This was a bit too much salt. Next time I’ll go for about 6 tsp. Clara doesn’t mention salt, but I think the loaves would taste flat without it.
warm water – About 6 or so cups, but you need to go by what the dough needs.
I followed Clara’s direction to dump the flour in a large bowl. I then mixed in the salt. Make a well in the flour and put the yeast in. Start pouring warm water into the well. Mix the yeast and water with your fingers to dissolve. Start mixing in more flour with your hands, adding water as needed. You will eventually end up with a great big bowl of dough.
After I got all the flour mixed in and I kneaded it in the bowl for a bit, I dumped the dough on the counter and washed out the bowl.
I sprayed the bowl with cooking spray and put the dough back in, turning it to bring up the oiled side. I’m not sure how Clara handles this step, but it’s the way I like to do it. If I knew the dough wouldn’t stick to the bowl, I would have just left it in the bowl to rise without washing and oiling it.
Let the dough rise in a warm place. Cover it loosely with a clean towel while it rises to keep the dough from drying out. After it’s risen, punch it down and divide it up for loaves. I was thinking that this amount of flour would make about 8 loaves. Some of the loaves seemed a bit small though, so next time I may go with 6 instead. Also, I only have 7 bread pans. I liked how the loaf on the cookie sheet turned out though.
Cover the loaves with a clean towel again and let them rise a while longer. Place them in an oven at 350 degrees. I have speed bake (convection oven) and I baked mine for about 30 minutes.
I’ll try this again. Like I said, I need to cut back on the salt a little bit. I think that also might help the loaves rise a bit higher. The taste is good. We polished off 2 loaves in less than 24 hours! The rest went into the freezer for later.
As for cost:
$1.97 – flour
$1.00 – $1.50 for yeast, depending on how much you use and the cost of the jar
So, less than $3.50 for 8 loaves of bread. That’s pretty cheap! And no additives or preservatives, so healthier than store-bought. If you try this, let me know how it turned out for you.
{ 35 comments… read them below or add one }
I LOVE making my own bread.
I try to bake 2 loaves every weekend.
And YOU KNOW what YOU put into it so you KNOW what is going into your kids!! I’m off to check her out. I LOVE cooking staples here at home. Sometimes I just scratch my head at friends who eat out all the time and then wonder why they don’t have as much cash, time with thier family to chat or are not loosing weight (not that I am, ha ha). We went out to eat for the first time in months on Friday to celebrate our oldest daughter making honor roll. A family of 6… $64.17 before tips! And there was SOOO much food in each portion size we ended up taking home FIVE take out boxes! From now on they can choose their favorite meal and we’ll make it AT HOME!
I love watching Clara’s depression cooking on youtube. A friend just told me about her last week. She made a recipe, but I am not sure which one. I haven’t tried any of the recipes yet, but I think this one would be a great one to try first. I only have 2 loaf pans though. I may be borrowing from the neighbors! LOL.
Wow! That is an awesome money saver! So I have 2 questions. First, can you use wheat flour in the recipe to add more fiber? Like maybe half white half wheat?
And second, when you freeze your bread do you use any special wrap or bags? I’ve been wanting to freeze some since there are only 2 of us and we rarely finish a loaf. Just wasn’t sure if there is a method to freezing and then thawing. Thanks!!
Erin – I like baking bread too. I usually make whole wheat, but I’ve been out of the habit lately.
DiPaola Momma – I hear you on the cost of eating out! We always drink water to save on the cost of drinks too. It’s unreal how much it costs to eat out with a family of 6!
Heidi – that’s a great idea to borrow bread pans. I really liked the loaf I baked on the cookie sheet too.
Superjaxster – Whole wheat flour tends to make the loaves pretty heavy, even if you add 1/2 bread flour. Try it and see how it works. If you do, let us know how it turns out! As far as freezing the loaves, I just wrapped in foil, but we go through them fast. If it was going to be in the freezer longer I would have used heavy duty foil or ziplock freezer bags. Just thaw them out on the counter.
I’m definitely going to try this. In fact I think I will buy the flour today since I don’t have a full bag right now.
I’ll let you know how it comes out!
This would be such a great “team” project to do with a friend. Then I wouldn’t have to figure out where to store 5 loaves of frozen bread. =)
What a fabulous post! I am going to go watch Clara right now. The bread looks yummy, there is nothing like homemade bread.
How awesome is that! I love all your step by steps.. Just stumbled upon your blog.. nice to meet you!
yum…kind of reminds me of Irish Soda Bread….which is totally on my menu tonight…..
Thanks for visiting!!
Man, I love bread, too bad my hubby and I decided to cut back. Looks like a great recipe.
I went home last night and made 6 loaves of bread from this recipe. It was very simple and turned out delicious.
The only minor issue is that my biggest bowl could have been bigger! That’s A LOT of flour…LOL!
That is so cool to have Clara around teaching us what she did during the depression.
I will have to try the bread.
I would oil my bowl too. I always have because I don’t want it to stick.
Thanks for sharing.
As for the Key Lime juice…you can buy the key limes in the produce section and juice them (all 28 of them) if you want to, but I use Nellie and Joes Key Lime juice from Key West(in a bottle). Not sure if your Walmart has it, mine does not. You can get it at Kroger or a Wholefoods store.
It is great. I do not use Persian limes because they seem too bitter to me. Key limes are the little small round ones.
Have fun with the recipe and make sure to use Baker’s Joy or Pam in the bottom of the pan so it won’t stick.
Wow…that’s interesting. I’ll bet Clara could teach me a lot. How did you store all that bread?
Thank you SO much for sharing this–I am bookmarking it to try it soon!
And, thanks for stopping by my blog!
thanks for stopping by my blog! your recipes look wonderful! I’ll have to book mark your blog!!
I am soo going to be trying this recipe next week on my days off of work. We go through bread like it’s going out of style here at our house.
I made this recipe yesterday and LOVE it! It’s sooooo yummy!
I haven’t made this bread yet because I don’t have enough loaf pans. I guess I should look at the local dollar store to see if they have loaf pans.
Every once in awhile I make homemade bread and my family goes crazy. I can’t wait until I am able to serve this to them.
So many recipes that I want to try – will just have to pick 1 or 2 and start trying them. Being new to your website, it seems as though I found so much of the things I enjoy here!
We LOVE to watch Clara!! My 6 yr. old dd will ‘request’ her!I tried making this from her video and halving it. I’m with you, it needed some salt. How do you freeze it so that it tastes fresh when you pull it out of the freezer?
Thanks again for being that ‘irl’ person to try out these recipes!
BRILLIANT!!! I’m so doing this! Bread makes me nervous, but I’m so going to try this!!
I’ve been thinking of things to do with my girls since they are off from camp next week. Baking bread is now on my list.
If you wanted to use some whole wheat flour but didn’t want the bread to be heavy you could use one half or two thirds white whole wheat and the rest plain white flour. King Arthur Flour has it in 5 pound bags, it is a little more expensive than white flour but it is very healthy. I love Clara too and am so excited she has written a book, can’t wait to get it when it comes out in October.
I buy my yeast in 2 lb bags from Sam’s Club. It is even less expensive that way.
I bake all my bread on cookie sheets. If you flour the bowl and the counter (and your hands) it doesn’t stick as much. I don’t mind a little sticking to the bowl when it rises.
I made 6 loaves 2 days ago. My family loved it. My husband took a loaf to work today and it was gone quickly. At first when I took it out of the oven, the top was very hard but I lightly covered it overnight and by the next am it wasn’t quite so hard. Thanks!
If you are using whole wheat flour and want to get a better rise out of your bread add 1 1/2 tsp of Vital Wheat Gluten for every cup of whole wheat used. You can buy Vital Wheat Gluten at you local supermarket. It is normally sold where the flour is.
Here is a wheat bread recipe that I use. It turns out perfect.
1 tsp. salt
2 c. wheat flour
2 c. white flour
1/2 c. olive oil
1/2 c. sugar
1 1/2 c. water
1 tblsp. yeast
Add all ingredients to bread machine and run on dough cycle. Remove from machine and divide in two. Place each 1/2 in a greased loaf pan, cover with damp cloth and let rise again (about 1 hour, depending on temperature).
Bake at 350 for 25-30 mins.
You can adjust the ratio of white/wheat flour if you prefer. If you do all wheat flour, you might need to run it through the dough cycle twice as it can take longer to rise.
You can also cut back the sugar a bit. The sugar is necessary to activate the yeast so you can’t sub Splenda or other sweetner.
Off to check out Clara!
I do love her! I’ll have to give this one a try!
I am making this right now…so excited to see how it goes!
Just gave you a shout-out! LOVE the bread!
Here it is–
http://www.cupcakemommiesmenus.com/2009/10/bread-bread-and-more-bread.html
This bread looks wonderful. Just may have to give this a try.
I tried this recipe last week. It was a little scary because I am not good with “guesstimates” I used all whole wheat flour, some white whole wheat and some traditional whole wheat, 3T of yeast. I also added vital wheat gluten, 1/4 t for each cup. I did forget to use enough salt. But the taste was still good. I was looking for a whole wheat recipe that was dairy free and this fit the bill.
Everyone (family of 5, including 3 boys) liked it. It was less crumbly than my other breads, probably due to the extra gluten. It rose well, but then sank when I took the damp cloth off. Never a good sign. But it did rise again in the pans, but didn’t rise in the oven. So the loaves were not as high as I would like. I’m going to try this again, making sure I use the right amount of salt and maybe a little less gluten. Not sure about the rising time, I did 1 hr for the first rise, 10 min rest before rising 40-45 min in the pan, maybe a little longer. I also cut it back because I only wanted 4 loaves at a time.
Thanks for this recipe as it’s making me “thing outside the recipe”!
Is there any way to reduce this recipe? I’d love to try it, but not sure what we would do with all that bread! Thanks!