Like my grandparents, many families in our neighborhood had outdoor, backyard brick ovens. Gramma Mollico baked bread in that oven for many, many years. My dad told me that she called the bread, pane della terra; bread of the earth. By the time I was born, the oven in our backyard was dismantled and the base was used as part of the clothesline system my grandfather assembled in the backyard. He attached a tall pole to the base and had clotheslines running across the backyard from our third floor apartment and Aunt Katie’s second floor back porch. Gramma Rinaldi could walk outside and put her clothes basket on top of it while she hung out her clothes to dry. Our family moved the traditional bread baking to inside the house. But, I do remember Mrs. Galasso next door baking bread in her backyard oven. She did not speak English but knew that the kids hung around her to get a crust of her hot bread fresh from the oven.
I’m not a bread baker. I always thought anything having to do with yeast is just too difficult to master. Every one in a while, I think about buying a bread making machine but that just seems so against the centuries old art of bread making. Even after Gramma Mollico died, her daughter, Gramma Rinaldi, and every one of my aunts baked bread in their kitchen ovens. For some reason, probably the same as mine, my mother never baked bread for us. Then again every time any one of the women in the house baked bread, we always received a loaf of bread. So, Mom never had to bake bread. Maybe it had to do with her being Polish; her mother never baked bread either. Maybe her family did not carry on the tradition of bread baking. I haven’t passed on the art of bread baking to my daughter either. My reasoning is because it takes up too much of my time and you can find pretty good bread at the market.
It’s sad that a traditional food staple has been reduced to buying bread from the supermarket after centuries of making it at home. The saying, “good as sliced bread” is lost on me because I do not like store bought, white sliced bread. I search out freshly baked, crusty bread every time I step in the market. And, I am willing to pay top dollar for good bread. There is nothing in the world like hot bread with cold butter; I could eat the whole loaf. I cringe every time my daughter brings home plain, white sliced bread packed in a plastic sleeve. She likes the bland, soft, store bought white bread. I guess because she never tasted pane della terra.
My Aunt Angie, dad’s older sister, baked bread all the time. When she baked bread, she baked numerous loaves and just like Gramma, everyone got a loaf of Aunt Angie’s bread. Her kitchen always smelled so great when she baked bread. She baked all kinds of bread; white, wheat, raisin, and my dad’s favorite, sausage. Me, I just loved her crusty, white bread.Happily, her daughter, Carole, carries on the family tradition, so the family art of bread making isn’t totally lost. Hopefully, one of her daughters will learn to bake bread and carry on the tradition without the use of a bread machine.
Gramma Grace Rinaldi Bread Recipe
· 3 Sm. Packages yeast
· 3-4 Cups Warm Water
· 3 tsp. Salt
· 1 Stick Butter
· 5 Lbs Flour
· ½ Cup Lard
· 2 eggs (optional)
Dissolve yeast in warm water. Add salt and butter. Knead in flour, eggs, and lard. Use judgement if necessary to add more warm water to make dough. Put dough in a large bowl, cover and let rise. Punch down and let rise again. Cut enough dough to fill bread pan half way up. Spritz oven with water and bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.
Note: Since I can’t bake bread and really wanted to give it a shot when we bought self rising flour by mistake. I tried a recipe that I found on the All Recipes.com website and it actually came out pretty good. However, the second day it tasted kind of stale. So, eat it on the day it’s baked.
BEER BREAD
INGREDIENTS:
3 cups self-rising flour
3 tablespoons white sugar
1 (12 fluid ounce) can or bottle beer, room temperature
1/4 cup margarine, melted
DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Lightly grease a 9x5 inch baking pan
In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar and beer. Mix just until blended. Scoop into prepared baking pan. Pour melted margarine on top of loaf
Bake in preheated oven for 45 to 60 minutes, until bottom of loaf sounds hollow when tapped.
