Customer Reviews

Prairie Home Breads: 150 Splendid Recipes from America's Breadbasket

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4 star:		(1)
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This book was recommended to me by a friend. I am ever grateful to him for finding it. It takes me to this imaginary place of great grandmothers, grandmothers, farms, and recipes over a century old. Even before I tried my first recipe from this book, it brought about certain nostalgic emotions inside of me. With the descriptions that accompany each recipe, I see a little piece of history that could have been my own German grandmothers had she shared it with me. Unfortunately, while she did teach me a lot about cooking, baking and handing down recipes wasn't something she did a whole lot of. My mother was the baker and she was more of a "new world" baker than someone who used recipes given to her by her mother or grandmother. This book makes up for part of that in its own special way.

I received the book two days ago, thumbed through it once, then twice, and tonight I made my first two recipes. In fact, one just came out of the oven..."fly off the plate" rolls. One word: Heavenly. Among the best dinner rolls I've had or made. Slightly sweet, buttery, rich, yet light and full of flavor. Definitely something to accompany a dinner of flavorful comfort foods like pot roast or roast turkey and stuffing...even something like chicken stew.

For those of you lacking the comfort that comes from having time-tested old-world recipes handed down to you, this book is for you...and even for those of you who aren't lacking it, this book will prove to be one of your favorites.

and smell the perfume of fresh baked bread through this pages.

The variety of recipes here is truly amazing. You'll find recipes coming from all over the US, with a distinctive italian, dutch, north and east european flavour. Accompanied with a short story about the origin of the bread, the recipes are well explained and good result is garanteed, even if you haven't got much experience because the instructions are very clear.

Chapter 1: yeast breads (swedish rye, cheddar chive bread, amish pinwheel bread, pizza)
Chapter 2: Naturally leavened and slow-rising breads (prairie pioneer two day bread, sourdough graham bread, sour rye bread)
Chapter 3: whole grain breads (northern prairie barley sunflower bread, wisconsin onion dill bread)
Chapter 4: Rolls and buns (farmhouse rolls, Iowa corn clovers, heart of the prairie parmesan rolls, german soft pretzels)
Chapter 5: quick breads, muffins and popovers (gingerbread muffins, blueberry cornmeal muffins)
Chapter 6: Scones, biscuits, crackers and soda breads (irish buttermilk soda bread, thyme biscuits)
Chapter 7: Coffee caks and pastries (cardamon and cinnamon scented swedish tea ring, summery lemon coffee cake with fresh berries)

Besides all this bread recipes, there are some that uses stalled bread to cook delicious salads and desserts Heirloom Apple Charlotte.

I totally recomend this book
Note: If for you is important, be aware that this book has no pictures, but if you ask me, you won't need them!

In Prairie Home Breads, culinary expert Judith Fertig showcases 150 outstanding recipes for a variety of breads. Categories of breads include Yeast Breads; Naturally Leavened and Slow-Rising Breads; Whole-Grain Breads; Rolls and Buns; Quick Breads, Muffins, & Popovers; Scones, Biscuits, Crackers, and a Soda Bread; Coffee Cakes and Pastries. The recipes range from simple family meal favorites, to celebratory breads ideal for even the most festive occasion. The recipes are complete, easy to follow, and accessible to even the most novice kitchen chef. A strongly recommended addition to any cookbook shelf collection, Prairie Home Breads is enhanced with two useful sections "Source Guide" and "Prairie Bakers", as well as a user-friendly Index.

My daughters and brother (He's an excellent cook and baker.) examined the table of contents with me and we were all thrilled by the possibilities. There's a lot of variety in the selection of recipes, but one has to be careful. Fortunately, I have one sibling who burns off whatever he eats, so he has sampled Decadent Chocolate Cherry Bread (Is this bread? Or is is a melted chocolate chip?), Prairie Painter Oatmeal Bread (He bet me that it would fall apart...) and Amish Pinwheel Bread (He wants more breads to be like this one!). Yet to be savored is the Volga German Peppernut Bread that just came out of the oven - both loaves of it, although the recipe heading says that it makes one large loaf. The author really did not totally test each and every recipe in this book, as I realized when the Peppernut recipe kept calling for more and more flour. It would seem that with six cups of flour the true amount of yeast should be more like 2 packages. Well, we shall see as soon as it's cool enough to cut. The chocolate cherry bread has so many chocolate chips in it that chocolate was running all over the counter after tipping the bread out of the pan. Reducing the amount to one-half of the amount the author recommends would seem appropriate. The Prairie Potato Starter seems to be working exactly as advertised and I suspect that it will work - I own Buckeye Cookery and read the information on bread. Baring an accident with temperature or contamination, there will be an antique loaf of bread produced in my kitchen, but not until next week sometime. Readers be advised to use caution when selecting what to make and test it ahead of time...

I was lucky enough to receive an advance copy of this book several weeks ago, and I haven't put it down yet! I love the satisfaction that comes with making delicious bread from scratch, and there are so many wonderful recipes in Prairie Home Breads that I can't wait to try. Ms. Fertig included everything from basic breads to more elaborate and unusual recipes, so anyone can follow along! I've already purchased several copies as Christmas presents for my friends.

I just received this book and made the "Old-Fashioned Buttermilk Bread" yesterday. It was my first try at a slow-rising bread using a sponge that ferments for 8 hours. The bread turned out well- a good sandwich bread. It made wonderful toast!

Prairie Home Breads is written in a straight forward manner, but is a bit lean in information for very beginning bread makers; I would not say it is the best basic bread book currently available. I have close to 50 bread books, and this one is better for an advanced beginner. I enjoyed the historical and baking "sidebars" interspersed among the recipes. There are some nice looking recipes for non-bread extras included as well.

I just baked the Pumpkin Rolls (actually Herbed Squash Rolls on p. 118, without the herbs), which came out perfect! Just what i wanted! And i just made the Schmierkuchen on p. 198, (actually it's called Cheese Pocket Coffee Cake), which is nice, and different; it's much better cold, the filling is almost like ice cream, although the cake is a little coarse and bready.
It tells how to make your own sourdough starter from the very scratch, using grapes as a source of yeast.
PS To the pumpkin rolls, i added 2 egg whites, used whole wheat bread flour instead of white flour, and used olive oil instead of butter, as i do with all recipes. And in the coffee cake, i changed white flour into whole wheat bread flour and used a smaller pan than called for.

This bread book is worth every penny. I bought this book for my Boyfriend who has a new love for baking breads. This book is all that and then some !!Great recipes easily understood and plenty of yummy goodness went into this book ~~~


Id buy it agian !

Maybe for my SIL

I purchased this book because of the reviews. While I consider it an adequate book, most recipies are pretty basic. Thus, seasoned bread bakers may be disappointed. The directions are layed out in a double column format and are not logically ordered. For instance, if the oven needs preheated or pans need preparation, I prefer this information to be set out at the beginning of the recipe. This book puts steps such as those at the end of the recipe. Of course, anyone will read through the recipe before starting work, but I still like things to be set out sequentially. Novices may be somewhat confused by the formatting and may miss some steps, particularly if they are not well organized themselves. The whole grained bread recipes show a nice variety, although I haven't tested them, yet. If you are someone who likes multiple cookbooks on the same topic, this may be a decent addition for your collection. If you are looking for only one book, I'd pass on this one and purchase something else. "The Bread Baker's Apprentice" and "Bernard Clayton's Book of Breads" are two volumes that come to mind.