By Cindy Nabb

We bake bread here at the Nabb house.  We bake lots of bread.  Every week at least twice we bake four loaves of bread of which we make sandwiches, toast, spread with butter and jam or just eat.  I thought I’d share with you how we make bread and why we don’t just buy it from the store.  

I started baking bread about eight years ago.  I made bread for fun using white or wheat flour that I bought from the store.  I used my bread machine to mix the bread.  I would then take it out of the bread machine and bake it in the oven.  My husband loved coming home to a dinner with fresh baked bread.  I was still buying bread but the bar had been raised, no longer were we satisfied eating white wonder bread.  So, I learned, I asked, I read books, finding different recipes and finding the best methods to bake bread.  

When baby number three was born, much to my husbands chagrin, I laid down my bread pans for quite some time and only got them out for special occasions.   I picked them back up again when a dear sister in Christ shared with me her bread making abilities.  She came over and showed me how to make bread, gave me her recipe, gave me a wheat grinder and a 50 pound bag of wheat berries.  She told me that if I was going to bake bread that using fresh wheat was so much better for us than store-bought flour.  I didn’t really know why, but trusted her educated opinion.  

I later learned the why’s of freshly ground flour.  Wheat that has been freshly ground is truly a whole grain.  Nothing has been removed or separated or added back.  When wheat is ground it loses it’s nutritive value  quickly.  After 24 hours, it loses about 45% of it’s nutrition and after 72 hours it is virtually void of nutrition.  Flour companies extract the wheat germ because of it’s high rancidity potential.  The wheat germ is the powerhouse of the wheat berry.  It contains vitamin B and Vitamin E which are  great for our skin and heart.  The bran is also removed from store-bought flours.  Bran is the basic fiber of the wheat berry and having a diet high in fiber, as we all know, is a good way to prevent cancer.  Enriched white flour that you buy at the store is just that, the government decided some time ago that flour companies needed to add back in some good stuff after they made it “shelf stable”.  The good stuff they put back in is 3 synthetic vitamins and 1 mineral.  

If you don’t own a wheat grinder check with your local health food store, sometimes they have a grinder on premises along with wheat berries that you can grind fresh there.  The benefits to your families health is worth the extra effort.

Here is my everyday bread recipe.

This recipe is used as basis for cinnamon bread, cinnamon rolls, pizza dough, herb bread and rolls.

• Preheat oven to 375
• 2 1/4 c warm water (hot to the touch)
• 1/4 c milled flax seed (milled in a coffee grinder)
• 1/4 c canola oil
• 1/4 c honey
• 1/4 c molasses
• 2 t sea salt
• 2 T Kal’s Nutritional Yeast Flakes
• 2 1/2 T vital gluten
• 5 c fresh ground wheat flour (more flour is needed later)
• 1 T 2t Saf-Yeast Instant Yeast
   

Layer ingredients in your stand mixer or Bosch mixer, add more flour until dough pulls away from bowl, approximately 1 1/2 c.  Add back up to 2 T warm water.  Knead in mixer for 5-7 minutes at speed 2 for a Bosch or medium speed in a stand mixer.   Dough should be soft and sticky.  Turn out onto well oiled board, divide into pans and let rise 30 minutes in a warm place.  Bake at 350 for 26-35 minutes depending on the size of your pan and your oven.  Bread should sound hollow when done.   

Makes 4-1lb loaves

By Jason Nabb

I have the great opportunity to volunteer with a wonderful organization, Christian Heritage.  I am working on a new program they are implementing in the Nebraska Correctional System.  The strategy of the program is to offer an opportunity to inmates to talk for 15 minutes, on video, to their children.  Then, the videos are delivered to their families.  Inmates are encouraged to read books, discuss their days, ask the children questions, etc., in an effort to connect, or re-connect, with them.  The program is a “franchise” of the Messages Project.  The Messages Project was started by Carolyn LeCroy.  She came to Lincoln for three days to train our group on how to shoot these videos and work the program.  She has a big heart and is outspoken about the impact this program can have on the lives of the inmates and their children.  

During our first shoot at the Nebraska State Penitentiary, I was having a conversation with Carolyn, a volunteer and an inmate.  He was waiting to go in and shoot his video for his children.  Carolyn asked him what he did to get in jail…he said “B & E.”  She asked if it was drug related (as it most always is) and he said “No.  I had no choice, my family needed food and I had no job and I…”

She interrupted him, “Now wait a minute, that is criminal thinking.  You can’t think like that and expect to get paroled.  What do you think the parole board would say if you rationalized your crime like that to them?  The world doesn’t ‘owe’ you anything.  There are other ways to provide for your family other than breaking in to someone’s house and stealing.”  (This is a paraphrase.)  He kind of murmured and agreed.  It was an epiphany moment for me.  I see  a huge lesson for my kids and it wasn’t long before I could put it into action.

I’ve been having a few issues with my oldest boy.  He has been thinking like a criminal.  He’s constantly rationalizing his bad behavior.   He feels as though he is “entitled” to certain things.  So, I explained to him how that kind of thinking is what gets criminals into the habit of crime.

• “It’s not fair!”
• “They started it!”
• “I didn’t mean to hit him in the face, I just swung at him and that’s where it landed.  It’s not my fault!”
• Lying
• Cheating at games 

These, and more, are all examples of excuses you could hear in your kitchen, or from inmates at your local correctional facility.  The idea that your own actions are not the cause of the consequences you currently face is “criminal thinking.”  I tried my best to illustrate this for my kids because I think it’s a great way to show the results of a lifetime of utilizing that logic.  Right now, it’s just an argument with a sibling, or trying to get out of doing extra chores, but, before you know it, it will mean standing in front of a judge and trying to explain how “there I was, just minding my own bidness, and there were these two dudes…” (thanks, Wendy, for the great example.)

God made us to love us and made us with free will so that we would choose to love Him.  When we choose to make excuses for our behavior and choose not to accept the consequences for our actions, we are robbing ourselves of the opportunity to reconcile these actions to God.  God forgives everything.  We do, however, have to confess our sins to Him.  You can’t do that if you’re thinking you never did anything wrong in the first place.  

Talk to your kids about bad choices and “getting locked up” and things like that.  If you drive by a police bust, talk about it, have your kids consider what that person may have done.  Talk about the fact that that person has probably made a series of bad choices that led up to them getting arrested and that those bad choices may have started out small and seemingly insignificant.  That’s how Satan sneaks into our lives, through a series of small, insignificant bad choices.  Then, sooner than you think, your staring at the world through bars…or worse.

Read the local news story about Christian Heritage and the Messages Project.

By Jason Nabb

I recently had the pleasure to write a guest post for “Breaking Free.”  The blog for Covenant Eyes.  Please read this article on preparing our kids for life in today’s sexualized culture and take some time to peruse the site.  It’s a great way to safeguard your home against the growing onslaught of internet pornography.

Also, if you decide to sign up for their service, make sure you type “purelight” in the promo code box and you’ll receive 30 days FREE!

Have a great day and God bless.

—Jason.