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Today, I am remaking my starter for the Amish Friendship Bread recipe that I have been using for years. This made me wonder how many of you make this delicious bread. I know there are lots of versions out there. Some require special ingredients like pudding mix, but mine doesn't so I thought I would share it with you. I'll post both the starter and basic cake recipe for those of you who don't already have a starter. The process takes some time, but is well worth the effort! I also have many other recipes that can be made with this starter.
Amish Friendship Bread Starter
1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
1/4 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
3 cups all-purpose flour, divided
3 cups white sugar, divided
3 cups milk, divided
Directions
1 In a small bowl, dissolve yeast in water. Let stand 10 minutes. In a 2 quart container glass, plastic/ceramic container, or a gallon size ziploc bag; combine 1 cup flour and 1 cup sugar. Mix thoroughly or flour will lump when milk is added. Slowly stir in 1 cup milk and dissolved yeast mixture. Cover loosely and let stand at room temperature until bubbly. Consider this day 1 of the 10 day cycle.
2 On days 2 thru 4; stir starter with a spoon. Day 5; stir in 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar and 1 cup milk. Days 6 thru 9; stir only.
3 Day 10; stir in 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar and 1 cup milk. Remove 1 cup to make your first bread, give 1 cup to each of 2 friends along with this recipe, and your favorite Amish Bread recipe. Begin the 10 day process over again (starting with step 2) or store the remaining 1 cup starter in a container in the freezer.
Note: Frozen starter will take at least 3 hours at room temperature to thaw before using.
Amish Friendship Bread
1 cup Amish Friendship Bread Starter
2/3 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Directions
1 Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease 2 (9x5 inch) loaf pans and sprinkle with white sugar. (The sugar is optional, but it makes a nice coating on bread!)
2 In a large bowl, combine the Amish bread starter with oil, eggs, 2 cups flour, 1 cup sugar, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda, 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Mix well. Pour
into prepared loaf pans.
3 Bake in preheated oven for 50 to 60 minutes.
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Re: Amish Friendship Bread
I've had this on my counter two weeks after the time I should have made it. I mashed on the zip lock bag but have not had time to make it. Is it ruined????? I do not want to throw this away if it is still good.
Re: Amish Friendship Bread
Hi I got a question why would the bread explode and does the milk not get bad sitting around on the counter for so long after it gets passed around a portion of the milk is still in the passed dough so how does that work?
Re: Amish Friendship Bread
"Time is free, but it's priceless. You can't own it, but you can use it. You can't keep it, but you can spend it. Once you've lost it, you can never get it back."
If you do it in a ziplock bag, the gases from the yeast will build up in the bag and you have to let them out every day or the bag will eventually pop, making a mess.
And when we made it, we did joke around at work about the "rotten milk". But I really think it has to do with the yeast, as it consumes the sugar and the sugars naturally found in the milk and breaks the milk down from its usual composition... incidentally, the byproduct of this cycle is the gas that builds up in the bag. Also, I figure that any bacteria would be killed during the cooking process. I do not know anyone who has gotten sick from this recipe.
Re: Amish Friendship Bread
Sour dough recipes have been around for generations and I agree with you, I have never heard of anyone getting sick from this recipe. I have been making it for years.
I personally don't like to keep my starter in a ziploc bag, but rather keep it in a jar with a loose fitting lid. If you put the lid on tight and forget to stir it regularly or go away for the weekend, the gases would build up in the jar.
Besides, they also say that allowing fresh air to get to your sour dough starter is good for it. The air is full of natural wild yeast that will increase the productivity of your starter. The loose lid just keeps out unwanted guests like flies...
Can we say ewww???
Thinking about Starters
Has anyone ever heard of Carl Griffith's 1847 Oregon Trail Sourdough Starter? I've been thinking about requesting some of this free starter for a while now and wondered if anyone here had tried it...
Day 5
Well today's day 5 and I'm glad that I posted this recipe to the group, because I forgot to mark my calendar and wouldn't have known when to feed my starter.
Does anyone else currently have this kind of starter going?
Freezing Starter
I actually usually freeze one of my starters in a ziploc freezer bag just to have an extra in case anything happens to the one I have out on hand. I kept my starter going for many years this way.
Unfortunately, my last starter was knocked out of the freezer and and destroyed...
I have never used frozen starter directly in a recipe, but it has always worked fine for continuing the starter process. I take it out and thaw it. Then stir it and count that as day 1. After that I just continue like the recipe says stirring it every day and feeding it on days 5 and 10.
re: Freezing
This is a great discussion thread since so many people make friendship bread, I'll be interested to hear the answers and input of others....As Ms.Bytes noted, there are a ton of different versions of AFB...So in answer to Randi's question, Lovina's starter version is very liquidy, so I think freezing would result in pure ice and would ruin it...other starter versions? Anyone out there who has experience with this, let us know!
Freezing Friendship Bread starter???
I made this several times last year, as someone brought in a bunch of the starter to work. We used the gallon ziplock bags and smooshed it around, but you had to be careful to let the excess gases out of the bag.... on of the other nurses had hers explode in her kitchen! Messy.
Now I remember several months later, one of the docs wanted some more starter and one of the nurses brought him in one that she had frozen. Now, I didn't say anything but I question if this starter would work anymore. Wouldn't the freezing process kill or deactivate the yeast? Has anyone else tried this??