The Best Bread Recipe Ever!

How to make a good loaf of bread? That is a problem I had struggled with for many years. My mother could do this in her sleep. Unfortunately, she took all of her recipes, which were in her head, to the grave with her, so she was of no help to me in this endeavor. A few years ago I tumbled to this simple recipe for making a great loaf of bread and thought I would share it with you. Actually, it makes two loaves of fantastic bread, but who's counting. I can assure you that this recipe will work the first time you try it and every time thereafter. To make this wonderful bread you will need two large cast iron kettles with lids in which to bake the bread, other lighter weight baking dishes will not achieve the same results, so don't waste your time trying them. The ingredients for the recipe are simple and readily available. Six cups or bread or all purpose flour; 1/2 teaspoon of dried yeast ( this is not a typing error, that's all you need); three teaspoons of salt; 3 and 1/4 cups of water. Simply mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl and stir in the water. This will produce very, very wet bread dough. Spray the dough with Pam or olive oil, cover with plastic wrap and let it sit for 18 hours. Do not manipulate the dough in any way (you couldn't even if you tried because it is so wet to work with). At this point, line two medium sized bowls with parchment paper: divide the dough in two roughly equal parts: punch down the dough and place each of them in a bowl. Now spray again with Pam, cover with a dish towel and let them sit for another two to three hours. Note, the recipe is very time consuming but requires very little effort on your part. Now, preheat the oven, kettles and lids to 500 degrees F. After the kettles and lids are oven temperature remove them from the oven. Remove the lids and lift the parchment paper by its corners to place the dough in the preheated kettles. The original recipe did not employ parchment paper in the transfer process; however, if you do not use this trick the bread dough will fall during the transfer process. Replace the lids and bake at 500 degrees F for 30 minutes. Remove the lids and bake for an additional 20 to 30 minutes at 450 degree F, or until each loaf is golden brown. Remove the loaves from the baking kettles and let them cool on a rack. Anyone can make delicious bread using this simple foolproof recipe. One cautionary note, however, this bread is not for weight watchers.

Cinnamon and the Gardener

I use a lot of cinnamon, not on my food, but on my house plants and organic garden. Literally, I sprinkle it on everything! Let's begin by discussing its use to control the gardener's nightmare the, dreaded "dampening off" syndrome. Anyone who has attempted to get an early jump on spring by establishing plants from seeds in a green house, or in seed trays on an indoor window sill, is all too familiar with the dreaded "damping off." This term refers to an array of fungal diseases that attach your sprouting seeds and lead to their early demise. Starting plants from cuttings poses a similar problem. Cinnamon is a proven fungus exterminator, better yet its 100 percent organic and relatively cheap. Simply sprinkle a little cinnamon powder over the bedding in which you have plated your seeds at weekly intervals to decrease the chances that they will be killed by the offending fungi. Cinnamon also is a very powerful rooting hormone. When planting cuttings, dip the cuttings in cinnamon powder before inserting them into the starting soil. This simple maneuver greatly enhances your chances of growing plants from cuttings. After inserting the cuttings in the starting soil do not forget to sprinkle cinnamon powder over the cuttings and soil to inhibit the "damping off" fungi. In any case, you can save a lot of money by using cinnamon rather than more expensive, and often less effective, commercial rooting hormones to stimulate root growth. There are several other non-culinary uses for cinnamon powder. Ants do not like cinnamon powder and you can sprinkle it around the garden, or entrances into the house, to deter infestations of ants in either location. Cinnamon powder also can be sprinkled around house plants to rid your plants of various molds and mildew. Finally, cinnamon powder can be used to rid your plants of gnats and other similar pests. In summary, cinnamon powder is a natural and affordable way to keep your indoor and outdoor plants healthy and flourishing. Why not give it a try?

Changing Times

I am now in my 79th year, and during the time I have lived on this wondrous planet, America has changed from Ronald Regan's "Shining city on the hill " to a debt ridden, amoral country where sodomy and full-term abortion are OK; illegitimacy in the black community is the norm; and one third of the country's population is on food stamps.

I was aware that this transformation was occurring but, for a number of serf-serving reasons, did little or nothing to curtail the amorality and political corruption that was destroying my profession and the country of my birth. I hope in writing this book to atone, in part, for my indifference. In this respect, if ever a soul needed forgiveness and redemption, it is I! In writing this book, I relied heavily on the statistical evidence Richard J. Herrington and Charles Murray presented in their remarkable book, The Bell Curve, to support my contention that many, if not most of America's financial and moral problems are a direct result of the falling IQ of our citizens. Our intellectual decline results from the fact that the birthrate of smart white women has fallen sharply over the last 50 years while the birthrates of low IQ women, of all races, has steadily increasing during the same period. The illegal immigration of intellectually challenged Mexican women also has contributed greatly to our country's intellectual decline. The remedies I suggest in America In Decline, such as the introduction of a National Identification Card, without which a person cannot work or vote, and limiting voting rights to those who pay taxes, are simple straight forward measures that, if implemented, would go a long way towards righting our floundering ship of state. However, unlike Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin, I do not believe significant political change can be achieved at the voting booth. No, I fear it will take a second American revolution to get our train back on the track to financial solvency and morality. Hopefully, our second revolution will not be as bloody as was the first!