Friendship Bread

For those who have run out of friends to bless the starter with I have a couple of "hints" or rather ideas that have been tried by others - and Horray! they work!!

If you only want 1 starter left over: After adding the 1.5 cups of "stuff" - measure out your cup of starter and put it in a bag. You should have 4.5 cups left. Take 2.25 cups (2 1/4) and set it aside... Complete your recipe with batter in bowl. Use the additional that was set aside for another batch - complete recipe as usual. And you have only your one bag of starter... Of course, if you don't want to bake 4 loaves of bread - just throw the extra 2 1/4 cups away... Until someone asks for starter and you can "friend" them a couple! LOL

If you want a pudding flavor that only comes in the small packets: Use 2 pkgs of pudding mix but cut the flour back by 1/2 cup.

If you are using aluminum (throw away) loaf pans: Use the spray but don't flour...

Adding nuts, coconut, raisens, poppy seeds, etc: Add them before your pudding or flour to make it easier to mix them in.

I use a complimentary extract: lemon for lemon poppy, coconut for coconut cream, peppermint with vanilla pudding, you get the idea! If I'm doing chocolate flavors I still add the vanilla... Don't know if it helps anything - but you can let me know~~

Flavors that have gone over really well in my house: Banana nut (with a real sliced banana in it) with walnuts, chocolate chips with vanilla pudding, lemon poppy, pistachio with pistachio nuts, chocolate fudge pecan (I got a bag of pecans in GA and need to use them!), vanilla pecan, butterscotch chip with either vanilla or chocolate puddings and of course, the regular, original is absolutely wonderful to use as the "shortcake" in strawberry shortcakes... The uses just go on and on!! I absolutely love the stuff! hehee

A hint for those with milk allergies!! I began using Soy milk several batches ago... I've found that it works very, very well. And it is really convenient too - since Soy doesn't need to be refridgerated until opened... and I almost always use the whole carton up anyway! I don't know for sure how many batches it will take to get all of the milk product from the starter.... but I'm hoping that it is gone now. Several of the Jell-O puddings do not have milk products in them! It states right on the box under the ingredients "No milk". So that's good news for my Grandson! Most of the store brand instant puddings that I have found - do have milk products.