Amish Friendship Bread...Revealed!

Congrats to the recipients of the Amish Friendship Starter: MaryBeth from Dunkin Cooking, Aleisha, and The Blonde Duck from A Duck in Her Pond! Hope you enjoy the bread and can pass along the starter to your friends.

Alexandra asked if I had the recipe for the starter and I sadly let her know that I didn't. The premise of the Amish Friendship Starter is that only the Amish know how to "start" it so you must receive it from a friend. Well, I'm 99.9% sure that a nice Amish lady wasn't the originator of the starter I received, but well...I suppose you never know.

Fast forward a couple of days, and I fortuitously happened upon a Friendship Starter Cookbook at our library's book sale. I couldn't believe it! Now I have a whole bevy of recipes to bake with my starter.

And without further adieu, here's the recipe for the Amish Starter:

Since I received my starter from my niece, I can't guarantee this recipe, though I'd like to give it a try. I'll be sure to post the results of any other baked goods I experiment with. Finally, here's the recipe and "feeding" instructions for your starter:

Starter Feeding Directions
DO NOT use any type of metal spoon or bowl for mixing. Don't refrigerate the starter

Day 1: Do Nothing
Day 2: Mash the Bag
Day 3: Mash the Bag
Day 4: Mash the Bag
Day 5: Mash the Bag
Day 6: Add to bag: 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup milk. Mash the bag.
Day 7: Mash the Bag
Day 8: Mash the Bag
Day 9: Mash the Bag
Day 10: Do the following:

Pour entire contents of bag into a non metal bowl. Add 1.5 cups flour, 1.5 cups sugar and 1.5 cups milk.

Measure out four separate batters of 1 cup each into gallon size ziploc bags. Keep one starter for yourself and give the other 3 to your friends, along with a copy of the recipe.

Cinnamon Amish Friendship Bread
Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
To the remaining batter in the bowl (we measured about 2 cups) add:

3 eggs
1 cup oil
1/2 cup milk
1 cup sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups flour
1 large box vanilla instant pudding

Grease 2 large loaf pans or 1 large and 3 small loaf pans.

In a small bowl, mix an additional 1/2 cup sugar and 1/2 tsp cinnamon. Dust the greased pans with 1/2 the cinnamon/sugar mixture. Pour the batter evenly into the loaf pans. Sprinkle the remaining mixture on top. Bake 1 hour. Cool.

Look at the other fabulous vintage cookbooks I found at the library sale. The sale consisted of all the books you can fit into a bag for a dollar! What else can you buy for a dollar these days?

Oh, and look at Betty Crocker's makeover:

Hope you had a good weekend!