Folar

I am so in love with bread.

Just plain old homemade white bread ranks very high on my favorite food list.

But, wouldn't bread be so much awesomer if it had bacon rolled up in it?

The answer is a resounding "yes!"-- except from the vegetarians, I suppose.

Well, we can thank the Portuguese, because they came up with folar, which is a bread with bacon and linguica rolled into the dough.  (Linguica is a sausage, sort of like a milder chorizo).

(I would also like to note that I grew up pronouncing "folar" as "foo-laud," but there's a distinct chance I say it wrong).

Now, I grew up on traditional folar, which has a heavy egg-bread as a base, but I tend to make it more like my not-at-all-Portuguese Dad who uses a soft white bread.

Would you like the recipe? O.K...

Folar (Adapted from the "Soft as Wonder" White Bread Recipe on Allrecipes)

1 1/2 cups water
3 teaspoons salt
9 tablespoons butter, chopped into little pieces
3 tablespoons honey
9 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups milk
6 teaspoons sugar
4 1/2 teaspoons bread machine yeast
1 package of bacon, cooked and chopped into little pieces.
1 packaged of linguica, cooked and chopped into little pieces.
Extra flour to coat the meat

1. Put all of the ingredients in your mixer, and mix together with a dough hook.
2. Let the dough rise, covered, in a warm place for an hour or two.  (Look for the dough to double in size).
3. Separate into 4 balls of dough.
4. Roll out each dough into a rectangle.
5. Coat the bacon and the chourica in flour.  (I mix the meat with a handful of flour in a bowl until it looks coated).
6. Sprinkle about a fourth of the meat over each rectangle.
7. Roll each rectangle up like a jelly roll.
8. Place each loaf on a baking sheet-- or in a loaf pan.
9. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes.  (Look for the loaves to brown on top).

10. Enjoy, and pretend like you're not eating some of the unhealthiest foods available all squished together.