Memories of Mom...and Baking Bread

By Carol Woolum Roberts

For those of you who have ever lost a loved one, do you ever feel them close by at times?

I felt my mom with me last weekend. Last Friday would have been my mom’s 93^rd birthday. She was on my mind a lot that day. I have a friend who is very good about telling me she is thinking of me on days like these.

Thinking of you on Mama Mary’s birthday.

I replied:

Today has been a tough one…really missing her. Thanks for thinking of me.

Some of my thoughts, when remembering mom, can focus on my failings as a daughter. The times I didn’t spend enough time with her. The questions I never asked her. The times my joking may have gone a bit too far, and were hurtful.

Most of my memories are fond memories, centered on activities in our home.

Like Mom making homemade bread on Sunday afternoon.

We shared about this some at our family dinner last Sunday. Christy remembers asking Mom about making bread on Sundays. She remembers Mom’s routine of cleaning house on Saturday, and making bread on Sunday---plus correcting papers and doing prep work for her upcoming school week teaching her second grade class. 

Apparently Mom enjoyed the dough making process and kneading the dough by hand, because “it helped get some of her stress out.”

I am a fan of the Great British Baking Show. Unfortunately, they only have one season each year. There is a lot of time between seasons to wait for the next competition.

I found another show, called the Great Celebrity Baking Show on the Roku Channel. Like the original Great British Baking Show, it also has Paul Hollywood and Mary Berry judging baked goods of British celebrity bakers who are baking for charity. These shows began back in 2012, so there are many seasons to enjoy to get my Baking Show fix.

What I enjoy most about these shows are the fact the celebrities are novice bakers, and the judges and hosts tend to explain a lot more about the baking process, and how to make the perfect “sponge”, or how not to get a “soggy bottom”.

With all these baking show episodes dancing in my head, I felt inspired to bake some bread from scratch last Sunday as part of my offering for Family Dinner. As I made the bread, Mom was by my side.

I had one packet of yeast in the cupboard. The recipe in my Betty Crocker Cookbook for French Bread only needed one packet of yeast to make two loaves.

Mom had a large white Pyrex bowl with some orange and brown designs on the side. I believe the pattern was Town and Country Cinderella.  I remember her using this bowl for mixing her bread dough, cleaning it out, and then greasing it and letting the dough rise in the same bowl.

I have a big yellow Pyrex bowl and I used it as my bread baking bowl.

I can’t remember the last time I made bread, and kneaded the dough myself. I loved the process. The five-minute rhythmic motion of rocking the dough back and forth with my hands was very soothing. I felt Mom next to me, looking over my shoulder, and telling me the dough looked good.

Once kneaded, I put the dough in the greased Pyrex bowl and let it rise or “prove”. Once the dough raised, I pushed it down and let it rest for 15 minutes. Then I shaped the dough into two loaves, let it raise again, then bake.

I liked how the bread turned out, and I think the family liked it, too. I am not sure it was good enough for a Paul Hollywood handshake, but a girl can dream, can’t she?

What will I bake this week for family dinner?

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What activity do you participate in that makes you sense one of your loved ones who has passed away?

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