Thursday, February 25, 2010

Carbs are my friend



I love bread.
No, seriously, I love bread. Those no-carb/low-carb diets would never work for me...ever.
If I could live off of bread alone, I probably would.
I go to the club stores and buy the humongous packages of yeast. Yeah, I'm that girl.
I've previously discussed my dislike for the Thanksgiving tradition that has been forced upon me. The food is gross as it is always re-heated, store bought food (including the turkey). The one redeeming thing for this meal has always been the rolls. Sweet jebus they are good. I knew better than to assume they were homemade, so I asked our hostess what brand they were.
"Sister Schubert," she replied. Score! I all but ran to the store to buy a bag. Crap man, they were pricey, but oh so worth it.
As I devoured the first bag I never dreamed that I could successfully recreate these beauties!

Of course I first searched the Internet for copycat recipes. I found one. It was good, but not spot on. So I tweaked it a bit and hit the jackpot. I made them for Christmas dinner when my family was in town. My sister took one bite and new exactly what they were. She has worked in the restaurant business off and on most of her life. A restaurant she had worked in used Sister Schubert rolls as their house rolls. She squealed with delight that we now possessed the recipe. She ate 6 rolls....no joke.

This recipe will make A LOT of rolls. Feel free to cut it down or freeze some dough, or bake the rolls and freeze some.


Best Rolls. Eat All Day (or B.R.E.A.D)
8 tsp. yeast (NOT rapid rise yeast!!!)
7 tsp. sugar
1 cup warm water
1/2 cup sugar
6 cups bread flour
1 stick butter
1/4 cup oil
1 egg
1 cup hot water
2 tsp. salt

This recipe is written for a standing mixer. If ya don't have one, just mix up and knead like you would normally do with any bread! Combine yeast, sugar and one cup warm water in a 2 -cup large bowl or measuring cup (this makes it easier to see when it is actually at two cups). Stir to dissolve and let rise until it equals 2 cups. In large mixing bowl, add 1/2 cup sugar,oil and salt. Mix well . Add egg, mix well. Add the one cup of hot water, and yeast mixture. Mix well. Slowly add flour and keep it kneading on low speed until the ball of dough is smooth and rebounds when you poke your finger into it. Take out the dough, spray bowl with Pam, put dough back in bowl and spray dough with Pam as well. Cover and let rise til double in a draft-free, warm place (I turn my oven light on and leave it in there).

Punch down dough and work down. Tear off balls (he he, I said balls) of dough that are about one to two inches in diameter. Place on greased pan. Cover and allow to rise until doubled in size. Bake in preheated 400* oven on LOWEST wrack. Bake until they just start to get a hint of color. You may think they aren't done, but trust me, if you wait till they're golden brown, they'll lose the amazing texture. Brush with melted butter. The amazing part is they are still super tender and yummy cold/room temp and for several days after!!
After rolling a crap ton of individual hunks of dough into balls, I was burnt out and running out of baking sheets. I opted to throw some of the balls (tee-hee) into a greased loaf pan, creating a pull apart loaf. Then, I got even lazier and just made a plain old loaf. All was good.


Monday, February 22, 2010

Crazed Mother, Aisle 10

I very nearly became that mother at Wally World yesterday.
Perhaps it was the fact that I was at Wally World and not other places that I would much rather shop.

Perhaps it was that there were none of those fabulous carts that can seat 3 children (yes, I know the cart says not to put a third child in the upper seat but I do anyway).

Perhaps it was the fact that the beautiful weekend (sunny and warm!!) had turned ugly (cloudy and rainy).

Whatever it was, it wasn't pretty.

For any of you who are thinking, "Oh I don't lose my temper with my children and they never misbehave," take your Stepford Wives self somewhere else cuz this isn't gonna tickle your fancy.

In hindsight, I probably should have turned around and left when I could not locate any of the previously mentioned required tools (read: 3-seater shopping cart). But I didn't, I pressed on. I told them to jump on, garbage truck style. Everything was grand until about 15 minutes in. Then Twin B decided it was time to unleash her inner Bad Seed. She the leader of my little pack. She is strong willed and mischievous. She loves to convince her siblings to do things she knows they shouldn't do, to kinda test the waters. She's not a bad kid, she just has that little devilsh side.

Within 5 minutes it was utter chaos. The bad behavior started in the dairy section (Wally Worlds are all pretty much the same, set up wise, so I'm giving you a visual). I flew through the aisles, making it to bananas (of which there were NONE...great). I missed lots of things I needed whilst trying to hurry. I had to run back a few aisles a few times to get some things. Anyway, back to the banana section. Pickles freaks out at the lack of bananas yes, my 2 1/2 year old knows where the bananas should be. Twin B decides now would be a good time to run away and bring her brother with her. I see her whisper something to him and off he goes.

"I'll get him," she chirps and off she goes before I can tell her otherwise.

It's at this point that I see our sitter. GREAT, just who I wanted to see, NOT. It's a whole other post, but I am actively searching for new childcare.

Twin A is just standing there smiling, holding onto the cart like she's supposed to. What am I supposed to do?? Run with her and the cart or just leave her, and the cart and run after the other yahoos? I tell her to stay up and I run (I kept her in eyesight and the sitter was right there too). Pickles had turned back and ran smack into me. I swoop him up and keep running. Twin B rounds the corner and locks eyes with me. She gets what I like to call, The Look of Death. I grab her hand and squeeze it tightly. She tries to break free, but I am not letting go! EVERYONE is looking at us. I'm fairly certain one woman took out her cell in order to call 911 in the even I lost it. We make it back to the cart and I strap her in the only seat available.

It looks ridiculous with a 4 year old (albeit a small one) strapped up in the baby seating, but it was necessary. She wails all the way to the check out like and till we make it to the car.

I can almost understand why you see those Moms who lose it on their kids at the Wally World...ALMOST