For the love of Blue Cheese!

WOW! Sometimes I get a little nervous trying a recipe from Allrecipes that hasn't been reviewed. I love to read the reviews and know someone has tried it before me. However, this recipe sounded so good, I decided to dive in and be the first review!!! It's raining here today and since the temperatures are cool, I decided to do one last day of bread making. Today's feature- Blue Cheese and Cracked Pepper Bread. Yum :)

First, this recipe called for Rapid Rise yeast, and I only had dry active yeast. I put 2 1/4 tsp of yeast in 1/2 cup of warm water with 1/4 tsp of sugar and let it proof.

The recipe called for room temp butter, eggs and milk. I used the same trick I do when making pretzel bread. I microwaved the butter until hot and add the cold milk and then the eggs...everything was then room temp!! I added this mixture to the yeast and 1 cup of bread flour. Stir well.


Add in 1 tsp salt, pepper (I used 1 tsp because I LOVE black pepper), blue cheese (recipe calls for 1 cup, I used the whole tub of crumbles which was 5 oz). Stir together with another cup of bread flour.


Add in the final cup of bread flour and mix until smooth. This formed a beautiful dough and since I was making it by hand instead of in a mixer, I dumped the dough onto my counter and kneaded it until smooth...about 4-5 minutes. Allow to rest for 15 minutes.


After resting, I kneaded the dough for another two minutes. The recipe is made to create one loaf of bread, but I wanted two smaller loaves (so I could give one to my mom). I cut the dough in two and pressed into two greased loaf pans. Allow to rise for 45-60 minutes until doubled in size.


Bake the loaves at 375 degrees for 40-45 minutes. The smell was amazing and they turned out beautiful!


Immediately remove the bread from the pans and brush with butter. I couldn't resist- I also had t0 cut a chunk off the end :) This bread turned out so delicious. Moist with a beautiful cheese crust and the blue cheese and black pepper really shine. A wonderful recipe I will make again for sure!