friendship bread

I think friendship bread is called that because you have to share the batter with friends, but also because only a friend can give you a 10 day long cooking assignment with out you throwing it back in their face.

So here's what we got from hubby's aunt 10 days ago: a gallon bag of batter and a sheet of directions. The drections tell us what to do each day. Days 1-4 you are just to smoosh the bag and let any air out, day 5 you add 1 c flour, 1 c milk, and 1 c sugar and smoosh the bag. Day 6-9 you smoosh the bag and remove the air.

Day 10 we are to prepare 4 new gallon bags. You pour the contents into a large bowl and add 1 1/2 c flour, 1 1/2 c sugar and 1 1/2 c milk. From this mixture, you pour 1 c each into the 4 bags.

With whats left in the big bowl you add:
3 eggs
1 c oil (or 1/2 c or less oil and apple sauce to make 1 c)
1 c sugar (or 1/2 c if you want)
2 t cinnamon
1/2 t vanilla
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
2 c flour
1 lg box instant pudding (any flavor will work)

We used coconut cream pudding, but anything should be OK. It's also best to let you staff sit on the counter.

Here's my tip for cooking with little folk. It's simple, but I did share a rather simple bookmark tip yesterday, so apparently anything goes here. When we measure out ingredients, I do the scooping and measuring from the jar/box/etc. Then, I dump it into my little helper's larger container, usually a measuring cup. They still get to add the ingredient, but there is much less chance that they spill the whole thing on the way to the big bowl.

Cooking with little people is a great way to work on math skills. This recipe needed 4 scoops of flour (4 -1/2 cup scoops). I told Bee that we needed 4 scoops and each child needed to add the same amount. How many scoops would each of them get to add? Her answer was 2 and my 4 year old just did some division. Bee and Lou each added one scoop each. I asked Lou how many scoops were left. He answers 2 and my 2 year old just did some subtraction.

The recipe makes 2 regular sized loaves. Bake for 1 hour at 325 degrees. The hard part is to try to get pictures before it gets gobbled up.

I am not 100% sure how you would start a starter. I would guess that you might start on day 5 with the 1 c flour, 1 c sugar and 1 c milk. Then, when it's time to divide up the batter, I suppose you would have only 3 to give away and 1 portion to bake. I suppose it would work.