Beer Bread

Last week my step-grandma, Terry, called me with a few recipes. One of them was for beer bread. Fortunately, I had two (read why that's important later) beers in my fridge (I don't normally keep beer since I don't drink it). It was a snow day and I was already in the kitchen cooking up some other things (to be blogged about throughout the week), so I got started on the beer bread.

It was super easy, she told me, you basically just throw the ingredients in a bowl, mix it up and cook it. Sounds easy enough, right? 

3 cups flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 cups sugar

1 ¼ teaspoons kosher salt

12 oz. beer

3 tablespoons melted butter

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter loaf pan and set aside. In a large bowl (of your stand mixer), combine flour, sugar, powder, salt and beer. Mix well until sticky. Pour into loaf pan and bake 45 minutes. After 45 minutes, remove from oven (leave the oven on), brush the top with the melted butter, cook for 5 more minutes.

I started my mixer with the dry ingredients and poured the beer in while it was going.

It'll turn into this big clump.

Then, you work it into a loaf pan, but it's not going to get smooth.

After baking for 45 minutes, pour the melted butter on and spread it around.

Bake for 5 more minutes

It'll come out looking something like this.

 

Now, a quick lesson.

Always: Listen very carefully when getting recipes on the phone. Confirm ingredient measurements.

You see, when Terry told me 1/4 cup of sugar, I somehow heard 4 cups of sugar. When making the bread (the first time), I thought this was an insane amount, but I went with it. That is, until, Jeremy asked me what the burning smell was and I looked in the oven to find most of my "bread dough" on the bottom of the oven (which did lead to other mishaps you'll read about this week). 

Jeremy helped me clean out the oven. I texted Terry and she said "NO! 1/4 cup!" so I got started again and the next batch was delicious! Good thing I had two beers, huh? It's a great bread for soups, chili, etc.