Amish Friendship Bread

Source: Unknown

Servings: 2 loaves
Prep Time: 10 minutes (after waiting 10 days!)
Bake Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 10 days + 1 hr. 10 minutes

Ingredients & Directions:

Do not use any type of metal spoon or bowl for mixing.
Do not refrigerate.
If air gets in the bag, let it out.
It is normal for batter to rise, bubble, and ferment.

Day 1: Do nothing
Day 2: Mash the bag
Day 3: Mash the bag
Day 4: Mash the bag
Day 5: Mash the bag
Day 6: Add to the bag: 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup milk, and then mash the bag
Day 7: Mash the bag
Day 8: Mash the bag
Day 9: Mash the bag
Day 10: Follow the instructions:

1. Pour the entire contents of the bag into a non-metal bowl.
2. Add 1 ½ cups flour, 1 ½ cups sugar, and 1 ½ cups milk. Stir with a non-metal spoon. It will be a bit lumpy.
3. Measure out 4 separate 1 cup each of batter and place each 1 cup measurements into a one-gallon zip-lock bag. You will now have four bags of batter. Keep one starter for yourself and give the other 3 to friends along with copies of this recipe. Be certain to mark the bag with the date of the new starter and let your friends know which day it is when you give them the bag. (Mark the dates down on the recipe.)
4. Preheat the oven to 325º degrees.
5. To the remaining batter in the bowl add:
   • 3 eggs
   • 1 c. oil
   • ½ c. milk
   • 1 c. sugar
   • 2 t. cinnamon
   • ½ t. vanilla extract
   • 1 ½ t. baking powder
   • ½ t. baking soda
   • ½ t. salt
   • 2 c. flour
   • 1 large box of vanilla pudding mix*
6. Grease 2 large loaf pans (these can be metal). Mix an additional ¾ c. sugar and 1 t. cinnamon together and dust the loaf pans with half of this mixture or until coated.
7. Pour the batter evenly into the 2 loaf pans and sprinkle the remaining cinnamon/sugar mixture of top.
8. Bake 1 hour. Cool until bread loosens from the pan, about 10 minutes.
   
   *(You can try any kind of pudding mix; lemon is really good. You can split the batter in half and use one small box of pudding in each loaf. That way you could have two different flavors of bread.)

Comments:

Since Vickie grew up with Amish families as neighbors, I figured I should get my facts straight before posting this recipe on the Bistro! So, here's a few things I learned about "Amish Friendship Bread" (I Googled it while waiting for the bread to bake):

• It's not Amish.
• According to Wikipedia, "The instructions distributed with Amish Friendship Bread typically omit instructions on how to prepare starter from scratch, and frequently claim that the recipe is a secret 'known only to the Amish'."
• The recipe I received also states that "only the Amish know how to make the starter," but I found a starter recipe at allrecipes.com.
• The starter can be frozen up to 6 weeks and saved for future use; just thaw for 3 hours at room temp before using.