Jalapeno Cheddar Bread

It’s that time of the month again- the Secret recipe Club time. Amanda from Amanda’s Cookin’ started this fun club as a way to try other recipes and help introduce bloggers to each others’ blogs. Every month, each member is assigned another member’s blog and he/she has to try and post about a recipe from that person’s blog. My assigned blog for this month was Heather’s Hezzi-D’s Books and Cooks.

Heather has a great blog with a lovely collection of recipes. She is a special education teacher and loves reading and of course, cooking. Occasionally she also posts reviews of the books she reads as part of her book club. Though she likes cooking, but baking is where her heart lies, much like me. So it had to be a baking recipe of hers that I decided to give a try.

I haven’t made bread for the longest time ever- been too lazy- not too lazy to make bread but extremely lazy to clean up after the baking is done. I hate that part of doing anything in the kitchen. I do not mind the cooking or baking but hate the utensils that pile up after I cook or bake, and that makes me lazy to make anything. And, being careless as I am, I make a whole lot of mess in the kitchen while I am at it, so the clean up just puts me off before even starting. But Heather’s Jalapeno Cheddar bread caught my eye and I knew this was what I wanted to make. So out with the lazy bones.

The only change I made to Heather’s recipe is that I substituted a part of the bread flour with whole wheat and reduced the cheese used to 1 cup instead of 1 1/2 cups (I love cheese but sadly, my waist and hips don’t)

JALAPENO CHEDDAR BREAD

This recipe yields a soft and flavorful bread that is perfect toasted, slathered with some cream cheese or butter. The dough is a little sticky and I would let it be a little sticky but smooth for the first rise as that would help while mixing in the cheddar cheese and jalapenos to the dough before the second rise. Also I would suggest to use a bigger pan than a traditional 9 by 5 inch one as the dough does swell up a lot.

Adapted from here

Ingredients

1 packet of yeast (I used 2 1/4 tsp of bread machine yeast)

• 1/4 cup warm water
• 4 Tbsp butter, melted
• 1 egg
• 3 1/2 cup bread flour (I used 2 cups bread flour and 1 1/2 cups whole wheat)
• 4 jalapenos, stemmed, seeded, and diced
• 1 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese (I used 1 cup)
• 1 cup lowfat milk (I used whole milk, since that’s what I had on hand)
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper

Directions

1. Pour the yeast into a small bowl and add the warm water. Mix gently and let sit 5 minutes.

2. In a large bowl mix the butter, egg, and milk. Whisk. Add in the yeast and water mixture. Whisk again.

3. Add the salt, sugar, pepper, and flour to the liquid mixture and mix well.

4. Turn the dough on to a floured surface and knead for ten minutes or until dough is smooth. Roll the dough into a ball and place in a greased bowl. Cover with a towel and let rise for 2 hours in a warm place-it should double.

5. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and slowly knead the jalapenos and cheddar into the dough, a little at a time. If the dough becomes sticky add more flour (up to 1/4 cup).

6. Once the jalapenos and cheddar are mixed in, put the dough into a greased bread pan. Cover again with the towel and let rise an additional 2 hours.

7. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Bake the bread for 50-55 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes.

Check out what the other SRC members made: