Friendship Bread

I remember having friendship bread as a kid and really loving it, probably because it has a ton of sugar in it and then it is sprinkled with sugar. And having made it again, I can tell you with utter certainty that it is very good :)

The interesting thing about this bread is that it is made from a starter and takes 10 days of rising and feeding until it is ready to be used. You can make the starter yourself [recipe below] or you can get a starter from a friend.

Whether you make the starter from scratch or get one from a friend, you end up with three more "starters" that can be given away to friends. Hence, friendship bread. This is pretty much the bakers form of a chain letter, except it is completely delicious and not at all annoying.

This bread is better known as "Amish friendship bread," however, in all of my in depth research [thank you, Google] I have not been able to track down any evidence that actually links this bread to the Amish. So, it is really just plain old friendship bread. It would totally be more interesting if it actually was a traditional Amish recipe. Sorry.

Friendship Bread Starter

1/4 cup warm water

1/4 oz [1 package] active dry yeast

3 cups flour

3 cups sugar

3 cups milk

*Note: Do not use any metal utensils or bowls in this whole process*

~ Dissolve the yeast into the warm water in a small bowl. Let sit for 10 minutes.

~ Mix 1 cup flour and 1 cup sugar together in a very large bowl. Add 1 cup milk and mix until the lumps have smoothed out. Mix in the yeast until well blended. Cover loosely. I used a plate to cover the bowl. You can you plastic wrap, just drape it over the bowl loosely. It needs to have a little bit of air flow. Set in a safe place. This is day 1.

~ Days 2-5: Stir mixture and recover.

~ Day 6: Stir mixture and add 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar and 1 cup milk. Stir until smooth. Recover and let sit.

~ Days 7-9: Stir mixture and recover.

~Day 10: Stir mixture and add 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar and 1 cup milk. Set aside 1 cup of the mixture to make friendship bread. From the rest of the mixture portion out as many 1 cup batches into glass or plastic containers as you can [I had 4]. These are your starters, you can give them all away or keep one for yourself. Make sure to give them away with these instructions. Use recipe below to make the bread.

Traditional Friendship Bread Recipe

1 cup friendship bread starter mixture

1 cup oil

1/2 cup milk

3 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

2 cups flour

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 [5.1 oz] instant vanilla pudding mix

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup nuts [optional]

~ Pre-heat oven to 325°. Butter two loaf pans. Coat buttered pans with sugar.

~ In a large bowl mix the starter mixture, oil, milk, eggs and vanilla together until well blended.

~ In a separate bowl, mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda, pudding mix, and salt together.

~ Mix the dry ingredients into the wet and mix just until blended. Fold in nuts.

~ Portion into the two prepared loaf pans and bake for 1 hour. Cool on cooling rack and enjoy!

There are many variations of the bread. You can have a lot of fun with it. Experiment :)