Bread Failure

Looks like my Bake Off dreams have been dashed. I can't bake bread.

I knew I'd be rubbish at bread making, hence why I have put off making it for so long. But just how terrible, I didn't know. I had hoped that it would be a natural skill that I possessed, that I was the female Paul Hollywood and I didn't even know. 

Alas, I suck at bread making.

I thought I would start with a basic loaf before trying anything fancy or adding any other ingredients. Mum was bought the Bake Off recipe book for her Birthday, and in there was a basic boule recipe which looked easy enough.

I mixed together 450g strong white bread flour and 5g of dried yeast with 7g of sea salt and 350ml of cold water. It was a big sticky mess and would not wash off of my hands, but I went with it, hoping that after spending the night in the fridge it would become easier to handle and look more like dough.

WRONG. 

It was still sticky and gross and had hardly risen at all. The recipe then instructed me to knead the dough, but only for a very short period of time, which was a relief. Then I had to leave the dough covered again, this time just on the worktop, to rise again.

I got back to the dough two hours later and it still looked the same size. Frustrated, I put the dough in the airing cupboard, hoping the warmness would help it to rise. Two hours later and it still looked tiny, but I was bored of it so baked in anyway in an oven at gas mark 8 for 30-35 mins.

It looked disgusting.

The bottom looked a bit better, but not much. 

I let it cool and when I cut it open IT WAS RAW INSIDE.

Fuming.

I'd spent all this time waiting for the dough to be ready and I couldn't even eat the bread I'd made. Waaaaahhhh.

Can you tell which is my loaf and which is the picture in the book?

I think what had happened was that the yeast was out of date so didn't provide the rise I was after. The yeast I used said it went out of date in 2017, but when I asked my parents they said they had opened it last autumn, and the yeast only had a life of 4 months after being opened. So I blame the dodgy yeast for this failure. Dad got home and insisted I try again, this time with yeast that will actually work.

So now I need to let this dough rise overnight and I will come back tomorrow with the results! 

After this bread catastrophe I was feeling annoyed because I didn't have anything to eat. So I decided to return to cakes (I know I can bake these) and made the most delicious honey cake! You will see it in a post later this week, it doesn't look like much but its so yummy!

Think I might just make my life easier and buy a breadmaker...

Becca xo