Life is funny. Just two days ago I was going through my recipe file and found my copy of the recipe for Amish Friendship Bread Starter. I thought to myself “Gee, I haven’t made this in 3 or 4 years, I should make it again soon” and left the recipe out on my counter.
Today, I stopped by my MIL’s house to be the recipient of some largess (she is going on a week long trip and I got all the fresh produce in the fridge!) and she gave me a loaf of Amish Friendship Bread, along with a ziplock baggie full of starter.
I guess great minds really do think alike!
Amish Friendship Bread is a funny thing-as far as I can tell, there is NOTHING Amish about it. You make it in a ziplock baggie (although you probably could us a crock or mason jar or something) and the finished bread recipe calls for a package of instant pudding (oh yeah, those Amish love some instant pudding). Also, it is a sweet bread, and almost more of a cake than a bread. It is a pretty frugal recipe, just calling for basics you should have in the house like flour, milk, sugar, oil, yeast etc.
The reason it is called friendship bread is because every time you feed the starter (in a 10 day cycle) you are supposed to use some of it, keep some of it, and give some of it away to your friends. However, if you did this every 10 days, you’d wind up with tons of starter, and your friends would start running when they saw you (Oh no! It’s worse than zuchinni~~She’s coming with the friendship bread starter again. Quick, HIDE!)
I found this excellent article a few years ago where a lady explains how to “manage” your starter. Basically, you don’t feed it as much sugar, flour and milk as they recommend, so you only double your starter instead of quadrupling it. Also, she talks about how you can freeze the starter as well. Her recipe for the starter and bread is a tiny bit different, it doesn’t call for instant pudding 🙂
I grew up on friendship bread. My mother and I used to make it all the time (okay, several times a year). Ours was simpler, no yeast or instant pudding, but the idea was the same. Whenever we moved into a new neighborhood, my mother would chat up some friends and then follow up with a loaf of bread and starter. We always had good neighbors in those days. 🙂
Wow, what a nice memory!