Great Aunt Jeanette's Maple Oatmeal Bread

Today is the day that I'm making sticky buns AND bread.  Because I'm hungry.  And I'm on a sweet kick.

Right next to my cookbooks, I keep a large untidy stack of papers and magazine bits.  These are my favorite recipes.  Some my mother copied down, some are from my Grammie, and some I have printed or clipped out long ago.  This bread is amazing, especially with my uncle's maple syrup.  Slightly sweet, full of flavor, and when toasted with butter...better than any other bread I've tried!

Great Aunt Jeanette's Maple Oatmeal Bread

Yield: 2 loaves

Combine:

2 cups boiling water

1 cups oats

1/2 cup maple syrup

1/2 tsp salt (I used sea salt)

2 Tbsp butter

Stir, and cool to lukewarm.

Dissolve 1 package dry yeast in 1/4 cup lukewarm water and add to oat mixture.

Add flour* (maybe up to 5 cups) as needed.  <-- Here, I added flour a little at a time until the dough came       away from the sides of the bowl and 'felt right'.

Knead (or use electric mixer 5-7 minutes) until dough is stretchy and when you slap it, it feels taught.  It will be a little sticky.

Let rise until double (depending on kitchen temperature, 11/2 to 2 hours).

Punch down.  Shape into loaves, place in greased regular sized (9 by 5?) dough pans.  Rise again about 30 minutes, until dough starts to reach top of the pan.

Bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes.

Remove from pans and cool on wire rack.

*All purpose flour works, but bread flour is really great!  <--My mother's side note.

(These loaves are very flat...because I had the sticky buns in the oven right before the bread and turned the oven off before putting the bread in...I didn't realize this until the timer went off 40 minutes later...still tastes good, though!)