A few weeks ago Sarah, of Sweets by Sarah, posted about making Amish Friendship Bread. I’d never heard of this cinnamon baked good before. In all honestly I was also a bit dubious about the chain letter aspect of the baking experiment, not to mention the frequent directive to “mash the bag” of starter mix that is bestowed upon you.
As fate would have it, a few days later my friend Courtney brought in a ziploc baggie of the yeastie concoction to the office for me to try. I dutifully followed the marathon list of instructions (a commitment of 10 days) and was pleasantly surprised to have two enormous loaves of seriously delicious cinnamon bread at the end of the process. For an extra zing I added a cup of cranberries to the batter. Now four of my friends and co-workers have been given batches of their own to try. Hopefully one of them will give me back a bag so I can make it again! Hint. Hint.
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i was given some Amish friendship bread and while I love the taste, my day to day life usually doesn’t lend itself to 10 days of consistent attention to it. Maybe if it comes around again I’ll give it a go with some fruit. Yours looks gorgeous as always. š
What a great concept…I love the idea. What gorgeous looking loaves. Wonder if this’ll ever reach where I live! YUM!!
I love the taste of this bread as well. However, I am too weirded out by the “baggie” of starter to do it for myself!
A few months ago I was *thisclose* to sending you a bag of the same starter that I was given. I just couldn’t figure out how to get it from UT to MA on a shipping schedule that would fit the mashing cycle. š I thought it would have made an excellent blog post for ErinCooks (especially the cross-nation factor) and now here it is! Mine turned out yummy, too!
ooh i did this awhile back and they turned out awesome!! i loved sharing:)
Oh How I Wish one of my friends would do this. Sadly, I’m one of the few “cooks” in my circle. So even if I started it, it wouldn’t make it very far.
Guess a batch wouldn’t make it from your side of the country to mine, huh? š
Our neighbors (to whom we gave a cup of starter) renamed it Amish Enemy Bread, because it made so much bread, and they had so much starter produced from that one cup that they couldn’t give it away fast enough. I like the bread, but not in the quanities that we produced, so when our neighbors threatened to bring the extra starter back over to us, I started thinking of the starter simply as “The Monkey’s Paw.”
So, I guess the moral of the story is, be careful who you give your starter to, so that you don’t create enemies rather friends!
If you do a google search, you will find the starter and recipes for this.
I had a good start on one and Christmas Eve, when the Grandchildren were cleaning my kitchen, they tossed it.
It does look yukky so make sure you have a note on it to leave it be.
Hi! I really enjoyed your post and was wondering if you would like to add your post and images to our friendship bread gallery on our Facebook page, Friendship Bread Kitchen (http://www.facebook.com/fbkitchen). You would receive credit for your image plus a link to your website/blog.
I’ve worked with food bloggers in the past including David Lebovitz and Clotilde Dusoulier, as well as Shannalee at Food Loves Writing and Peabody of Culinary Concoctions by Peabody, and Stephane at Chefs Gone Wild (Zen Can Cook). There are already some great images up right now from food bloggers you might know. If you have any questions, please ask. Thank you for your consideration!
best,
Mia
mia@miaking.com | http://www.miaking.com | http://www.facebook.com/fbkitchen
http://www.verybestbaking.com/recipes/Legacy-68428/Amish-Friendship-BreadCake-with-Starter-and-Variations/detail.aspx
This includes a recipe for the starter, as well as for several variations on the recipe.
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