English Muffin Bread

New Year's Eve 2019. The decade ends. The teens end. The 2010s — the decade of the bakery, the decade of Rosa's death and Alejandro's death and both Javiers' deaths and five children growing and a bakery thriving and a recipe notebook filling — the decade ends at midnight with twelve grapes and a prayer and a family that is smaller and larger than it was ten years ago. Smaller because the dead have taken their seats. Larger because the living have expanded: Andrea, who washes dishes next to me; Leticia, who takes lunch orders; Yolanda, who spreads masa faster than anyone; the two thousand Instagram followers who have never met Rosa but eat her recipes; the customers who come every morning and say "the usual" and the usual is a concha and a coffee and a three-minute conversation that is worth more than the two-fifty they pay.

I ate my twelve grapes. Twelve wishes for 2020. I wished: January, health. February, the bakery. March, five years. April, spring. May, forty-three. June, Sofia. July, Diego. August, Isabella. September, Rosa's memory. October, Camila. November, Thanksgiving. December, Luis Jr. home. The last grape, the December grape, I bit slowly, letting the juice fill my mouth, holding the wish as long as I could, because the wish is: home. Bring him home. The wish tastes like grape and like prayer and like the particular sweetness of a mother's hope, which is the sweetest and most fragile thing in the kitchen.

The decade in numbers: the bakery opened in 2015. Revenue in 2019: approximately eighty-five thousand dollars (Sofia's projection, which will be accurate because Sofia's projections are always accurate). Profit: approximately fifty-five thousand. The Juírez fund: three thousand four hundred dollars. The recipe notebook: one hundred and forty-two entries. Children graduated: one (Luis Jr.). Children deployed: one (Luis Jr.). Children in high school: two (Isabella and Sofia). Children in middle school: one (Diego). Children in elementary school: one (Camila). Parents buried: two. Nephew buried: one. Brother buried (before the bakery): one. Conchas made: approximately two hundred per day times three hundred and twelve days per year times five years equals approximately three hundred and twelve thousand conchas. Three hundred and twelve thousand. Rosa would say: that's a lot of conchas. I would say: that's a lot of Rosa.

I made rosca de reyes dough for January 6. The tradition. The faith. The dough rising in the dark. The decade ends and the dough begins and the beginning is always the dough, and the dough is always the faith, and the faith is always the bread, and the bread is always Rosa, and Rosa is always the beginning.

When I came inside from midnight and the twelve grapes were finished and the wishes were made, I went straight to the kitchen and started the rosca de reyes dough — because that is what my hands know how to do when my heart is too full for anything else. Not every baker has a rosca recipe ready for this blog, but what I can give you is this: a bread that also asks you to trust the dough, trust the rise, trust the dark quiet time between mixing and baking. This English Muffin Bread is that kind of bread — humble, faithful, and better than it has any right to be, which is how Rosa taught me all good bread should be.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 35 min | Total Time: 1 hr 50 min (includes rise) | Servings: 16 slices

Ingredients

5 cups all-purpose flour, divided
2 packages (1/4 oz each) active dry yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups whole milk
1/2 cup water
Cornmeal, for dusting pans
Nonstick cooking spray

Instructions

Combine dry ingredients. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together 3 cups of the flour, the yeast, sugar, salt, and baking soda until evenly mixed.
Warm the liquids. In a small saucepan over low heat, warm the milk and water together until the mixture reaches 120–130°F. Do not boil. Remove from heat.
Mix the dough. Pour the warm liquid into the flour mixture and stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until fully incorporated. Add the remaining 2 cups of flour and stir until a thick, sticky batter forms. The dough will not be kneadable — this is correct.
Prepare the pans. Generously coat two 8x4-inch loaf pans with nonstick spray, then dust each pan with cornmeal, tapping out any excess. The cornmeal gives the crust its signature English muffin texture.
Fill and rise. Divide the batter evenly between the two prepared pans. Sprinkle a little additional cornmeal over the tops. Cover loosely with a clean kitchen towel and let rise in a warm, draft-free place for 45 minutes to 1 hour, until the dough crowns just above the rim of the pans.
Bake. Preheat the oven to 375°F. Bake the loaves for 30–35 minutes, until deep golden brown on top and the internal temperature reads 190°F. The loaves will sound hollow when tapped on the bottom.
Cool and slice. Let the loaves cool in the pans for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool for at least 30 minutes before slicing. For the best nooks and crannies, always fork-split rather than knife-slice.

Nutrition (per serving)

English Muffin Bread — The Dough That Begins Again