Making Bread isn't that Hard to Do

Before I made my first loaf of bread, I was intimidated by the idea of baking my own loaves.  This was because I was ignorant; I didn't know how to do it, so I assumed it was a long a complicated process.  And in defense of all the bakers who spend their lives trying to perfect their loaves, bread making can be complicated, nuanced, and subtle.  It can be time consuming, thought consuming, money consuming, and add to your waist-line.

At the same time, it can be simple, pleasurable, fulfilling, money-saving, and even therapeutic.  You don't even need to know that much about what it happening to your dough to enjoy making a really good bread.  There are four basic ingredients to bread: flour, water, yeast, and salt.  Sure, there are techniques to kneading the dough, but these can be learned by a child.  I believe that everyone should be able to make a simple loaf of bread, if only for realizing that loaves of bread that you buy in the store have far too many ingredients. 

Bread making, or running a marathon, or parenting, or writing a book, or any great feat we want to do: they are all just magic tricks; mind-blowing when we first encounter them, but which seem obvious when we understand what it going on.  When the curtain of ignorance is lifted and we can see all the mechanics behind the magic, it stops being a magic, at least a magic that is outside our control.  When you bake your first loaf of bread, or run your first 5-K, or do anything else that you once thought impossible, the "magic of the trick" will be replaced by the "magic of life."  You will see how there are no secrets, only things you haven't learned yet.  That there may be no instruction manual to life, but a little curiosity goes a long way. As you bite into a warm baguette that you made yourself, you will realize that you have had the magic in our own hands all along.