Just Push The Pause Button

So in case you aren't into video games, Elder Scrolls V came out on Friday morning. Ld and a friend of ours are both ob-sessed. They went to the midnight launch party, and then played all day long yesterday at our house. Seriously, ALL DAY LONG. Whatever, we all have our obsessions. I'm obsessed with cheesy bread, but really, who isn't?


I found a recipe to make your own. Which is awesome because it combines 3 of my favorite things: cheesy bread, making bread (a new favorite hobby), and my stand mixer. I didn't realize you could use the dough hook to knead the dough, but you can, and it works out wonderfully. At least it does in this recipe.

The dough is kneaded and ready to rise!

To Make The Dough:
1 cup warm water
2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
1 tablespoon honey or sugar (I used sugar because I was out of honey)
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons olive or canola oil
3 cups bread flour (I used about 2.5 cups. I probably could used a little more, but it worked)

To Make:

In your stand mixer bowl, stir yeast and sugar/honey into warm water.
[Cb from ChoiceSustenance taught me the secret to knowing how warm to make your water. You leave your finger under the faucet while the water is warming up and once you no longer can detect a temperature in the water, it's ready. This is by far one of the best tips I've gotten, and this method has yet to let me down.]
Let the mixture sit until it starts to get foamy and smells of yeast (mmm...). This should take 5-10 minutes. Pour in your salt, oil and about half of the flour and mix! Keep adding little bits of flour until you get dough that's sticky but doesn't stick. Trust me, when you get the right consistency, that will make sense. Then, let your mixer knead that dough (turn it up a little higher) for at least 6 minutes. I made myself leave the room because I was afraid of hurting my mixer. It survived though, hooray!

From tiny ball to...

Once it's kneaded, it "kneads" (get it?) to rise for at least an hour. Grease up the bowl and put it in a COOL oven. This is the best way I've found to let it do its thing. I left mine rise for almost 2 hours and when I opened my oven, I was shocked to see how big it had grown.

...as big as the bowl!

And that's the dough. So I punched it down a little, and tore it in half.

To Make The Cheesy Bread:
1 little cup of Papa John's Garlic Sauce
1/4 cup of parmesan cheese
1/4 lb of mozzarella cheese
"Garlic Bread Sprinkles"

To Make:

I preheated my oven (with the pizza stone inside) to 500 degrees (last temperature before "broil") and spread out my dough into a circle on a piece of parchment paper (roughly the size of my pizza stone).
I brushed the whole thing (all the way to the edges) with the Papa John's Garlic Sauce. I could have made my own garlic sauce, but PJ's is delicious, pre-made and sitting in my fridge waiting to be used. Then I LIGHTLY sprinkled the "Garlic Bread Sprinkles" all over the entire dough.
[GBS is a real thing; McCormick makes it. It's expensive but we use it in my house all the time. It's great.]
Then you sprinkle the parmesan cheese all over and top with your mozzarella. I will use less parmesan next time though because I felt it was overpowering and I'm way more of a fan of mozzarella (string cheese anyone?).
You then transfer your parchment paper to your pizza stone and pop it in the oven (which is screamingly hot) for 9-10 minutes (or until it looks bubbly and delicious). Try and ignore the burning paper smell - that's just your parchment paper. It's only a small kitchen fire, right?

Mmmm, fresh from the oven. Look at that bubbly cheese!

Once you pull it out of the oven, TRY to let it sit for a few minutes before you cut and devour it (500 degrees is no joke people - that *s* is hot).


Finally the boys could resist their irl hunger pangs no longer and descended upon the bread. Within minutes, it was gone. The dough recipe makes two loaves though, so there could be more!