Beer Bread for Beer Month
Nothing's as simple as making beer bread, which takes longer to toast than it does to whip up in the first place. (You do have to bake it, however.)
Image: Courtesy Jesse Kunerth
It gives a new meaning to the Hair of the Dog breakfast: start your day with a slice of toasted beer bread, made with, perhaps, Hair of the Dog’s Adam, Ruth or Fred. Whichever beer you choose to leaven this homemade bread, it’ll be the easiest way to kick off any day all month, July being Oregon Craft Beer month. It’s also the easiest homemade bread ever.
Beer bread, a tried and true classic of home baking, is a natural way to get the multi-tasking most out of your favorite local beverage. The alcohol burns off in the baking process, so it’s also a fine introduction of the sudsy brew to any little ones in your household (though you might not want to advertise that fact).
With only four ingredients (some recipes call for even fewer) and a bit of stirring to be done, the process of making beer bread hardly even counts as work. It’s worth the couple minutes of time just to see the way the flour mixture foams up when you pour in that bottle of beer.
Fun in the kitchen – and that’s before you’ve even had a sip of the beer itself! Don’t cheat and drink from the bottle that is intended for the bread, though, or you’ll be leaving out some of the leavening yeast that will make the bread rise properly.
Easiest Beer Bread
Preheat oven to 350-375 degrees Fahrenheit.
1 can beer (12 ounces)
3 cups all-purpose flour
5 tablespoons sugar (or less)
7 teaspoons baking powder
- Grease a loaf pan.
- Mix together dry ingredients, add beer, and stir.
- Spoon batter into greased loaf pan.
- Bake 35-40 minutes, until browned.
