French Bread Recipe

FRENCH BREAD

Dissolve 1 pkg. Yeast (1 Tablespoon)  in ½ cup warm water.  Add 1 Tablespoon sugar, 1 cup quite warm water, 1 ½ teaspoons salt, 1 heaping Tablespoon shortening.  Add 4 cups flour.  Kneed and let rise 10 minutes, then stir it down.  Do this every 10 minutes for 1 hour.  Shape and let rise.  Bake bread at 350, rolls at 375 until brown.  Rub butter on top after baking while still hot if desired.

I usually double this recipe so I only have to get the 1 cup and the 1 Tablespoon dirty.  Also, I used to follow the recipe as it says, but through the years I have been lazy and just let the dough rise without stirring it down every 10 minutes.  I also use this dough to make pizza bread, where I just roll some of the dough out like you would for cinnamon rolls, but I put pepperoni and cheese or Canadian bacon and cheese instead.  You can also make individual pizza pockets for lunches.  I never make cinnamon rolls with this dough.  It isn't sweet enough.