After reading William Alexander’s 52 Loaves last summer, I launched my own project making bread of one type or another each week. Between the holidays and being stuck in a rut of bagels and zucchini bread, it has been a long time since I have shared a new recipe or type of bread.
I came across a post that charmed me at Farmgirl Gourmet. The author wrote about her ninety-four year old grandmother and the memorable Portuguese sweet bread she had made many times through the years. The two spent an afternoon in the kitchen baking the bread together. Photos of that day fill the post. Reading it I felt the loss of having never had the chance to learn baking at my Grandmother’s side. Working my hands through my own batch of the sweet dough helped satisfy the dull ache I felt inside missing the women and the warmth of kitchens that came before me.
The recipe is here, but even if you don’t plan to bake a batch yourself, it is worth looking just to see the experienced hands coaxing a big bowl of dough into something sweet for a lucky family.
