Do you have flour?

What about water, salt and yeast?  Then BOOM!  You've got bread!  

It is still very cold outside and sometimes you just need something comforting like fresh bread.  I was on call Friday and Saturday night which really took a toll on me this weekend.  David had the flu so I was taking care of him and yet trying to avoid him like the plague at the same time.  I felt like Sunday was my only true day off and spent much of it in the kitchen. 

Fresh French loaves are very easy and always welcome around here.  I mixed the dough and let it rise while I did the shopping.  I usually save time by making one fat loaf on a sheet pan but I got out my baguette pan for yesterday's bread.  When I backpacked years ago, I ate so much fabulous bread all over Europe and couldn't wait to get home and try to recreate those loaves.  I hunted for a perforated baguette pan as a trip souvenir but never found one over there so I ordered this one from somewhere when I got back.  I love the look of the late afternoon sun dappling the shaped dough and later the baked loaves.  Skinny loaves like this take only 15 minutes to bake in the oven and the upstairs was so wonderfully warmed by it's heat. 

I was digging in my cupboards earlier in the week and found some old Lipton Soup mixes with a website on them for recipes and decided to take a look.  They had a recipe for White Pizza Fondue and my interest was immediately piqued.  And it couldn't be easier!  I saw some sort of bacon soup/dip mix at Aldi which would also be good in this recipe.  I was even thinking that some cooked crumbled bacon might have been tastier than the pepperoni.  I always think pre-packaged dry mixes or sauces tend to under salt or season so I think this could have used a little salt to make it pop.

This is what we ate as a late lunch/afternoon snack yesterday.  It wasn't very colorful but it was carb heavy and warming and comforting.  Dave usually watches his sports TV in the downstairs living room but we sat together in the warmed upstairs yesterday and I put up with golf on my TV.  We don't see much of each other during the week and we avoided each other as much as we could on Friday and Saturday because Marek and I do not need to catch the flu.