Something new....: No Oven? No Problem.

A typical Japanese household doesnt have an oven attached to their cooking stove. Instead, we have one of these:

Wondering what it is? It's a FISH GRILL.

So coming home to Japan I've been feeling pretty antsy...can't bake, mom makes dinner, (I can only help, which kinda cramps my "I WANT TO COOOOOOOK" style.), and I dont have a gym to go to.

My mom came home yesterday with this book: "Bread, snacks, and ligh

t meals even with a RICE COOKER!"

cha-CHIIIING!! *sound of JACKPOT*

The book was filled with so many fun things-Green tea sponge cake, pumpkin bread, strawberry jam...

(I realize this book is in Japanese...this one is a recipes for sesame-seed cake!)

But before I try out one of these fancy schmancy recipes, I wanted to try making PLAIN BREAD with the rice cooker.

So here goes

Ingredients:
Flour - 350g
Butter - 21g
Sugar - 21g
Milk - 35ml
Water - 180ml
Dry yeast - 5g
Salt - 6.5g

How To:
1) Place flour, sugar, and salt into rice cooker bowl.
2) Mix dry yeast and water

3) Mix dry yeast and water mix into dry ingredients
4) Put in milk and butter
5) Knead the dough...It should look something like this:

6) Cover it with a clean towel, and let it rise for about an hour. (Go do something, read a book, chat with your friends...)

7) An hour later, bring the dough up, and then drop it from about 50cm high, back into the bowl, to release the gas.
8) Repeat X 4

9) Put it back into the bowl, wait for another hour.
10) Take it back out, and split dough into 3 big balls and four smaller balls.
11) Make then into long "snakes" Twist them into little braid-ish things, and then make little balls out of them.
(They should look like little braided balls...mine don't look so appealing at all....you can also add butter/margarine into the dough's surface while you are twisting the "snakes" around and arranging them into ball shapes)