No, I do not feel guilty having my almost 86 year old mother bake buns for every holiday occasion throughout the year. Now, she is. And, now I know more so have the capacity to actually learn from her. She was just too far beyond me those years ago. Hee hee hee hee! Of course you do! Not only did she teach me, I made them at the same time using my Thermomix machine and we did a blind tasting at the end. Truly, perfection. The yeast scented soft pillowy mounds were indiscernable: hers from mine, mine from hers.
Visually, they were different, and I think I know why, but taste, nose and texture β no. What a triumph. Thank you, Mom! You are my Kitchen Idol!
The recipe, written in her hand, is how they were written 60 years ago. No instructions. Everyone made bread. Everyone knew what to do with the ingredients. This recipe came from Aunty Pat. Pat Thompson. A dear family friend who enveloped you in her arms, sat you in her kitchen and fed you til your eyes fell out every time you visited.
I will never forget her warmth, her love, or her table. Think about it. Basic bread all over the world has 4 simple ingredients: yeast, flour, water and salt. Even if the amount of each ingredient was given, the magic really happens in the hand of the maker. Think Bannock. Think French bread, Italian bread, German bread β each vastly different and most with the same 4 simple ingredients.
Think any kind of bread you know. It is what you do with those 4 simple ingredients that makes all the difference. My mom was a master. Likely because she was born from a mother who had 13 siblings, on the farm where she and her mom fed threshers every year. She was very young when she learned how to cook and to bake. It is just how it was.
