Amish Friendship Bread Starter and Recipe

Living in Lancaster County is pretty interesting. There aren't too many places in our modern day where you share the roads with horse and buggies. Where you have to dodge road apples (horse poopie) walking into the grocery store. I love that there are quite a few family owned stores. I love that many of these small family owned stores offer wonderful prices. That they do not mark things up the way they could and most stores do. I like that one of my favorite variety stores prints a Bible scripture on the top of the receipt. I love that there are a large number of homeschoolers in this area. I love that most things are closed on Sunday. The landscape is beautiful. Best back roads ever! And the best part....it's a quilters paradise. So many quilt shops it's unbelievable! Yes, I feel blessed to live here. So I thought I'd share the recipe for this yummy treat with you. Many of you have had this before. It makes such a moist yummy bread.

The Starter:

2 cups warm water
2 cups flour
1 tsp. yeast



Put warm water in a glass or ceramic bowl or, my favorite, a large canning jar.(NO METAL)



Add the yeast and stir.



Add the flour and stir.


Leave uncovered or cover with a piece of cheese cloth. Do not seal. It can explode! Leave out on the counter. Do not refrigerate.


After a few hours in may look like this. That is good. Just leave it alone until the next day.
This is day 1.

On days 2 - 5 you stir your starter with a wooden or plastic spoon. NO METAL.

Day 6 stir and add 1 cup milk, 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar.

On days 7-9 Stir

On Day 10 feed your starter again with 1 cup milk, 1 cup flour and 1 cup sugar, stir. Measure out 1 cup of starter into 4 containers. Gallon size Ziploc bags work great as you will be mushing your ingredients from here on. Keep one for yourself and pass 3 along to friends with a copy of the instructions and recipe below. You could also keep one, bake one and pass two along. If you don't pass it along the first day be sure to tell your friend what day it is on when you give it to them.

(you can print from here down for when you give it away!)

Amish Friendship Bread

*Do not use any metal bowls or spoons, Do not refrigerate, Let air out (burp) bag occasionally, It is normal for the bag to rise, bubble and ferment.*

Day 1 (the day you receive the bread) Do Nothing
Day 2 Mush bag
Day 3 Mush bag
Day 4 Mush bag
Day 5 Mush bag
Day 6 Add to the bag: 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup milk
Day 7 Mush bag
Day 8 Mush bag
Day 9 Mush bag
Day 10 Follow these instructions.
1. Pour your bag into a NON-METAL bowl.
2. Add 1 1/2 cups flour, 1 1/2 cups sugar, 1 1/2 cups milk.
3. Measure out 4 - 1 cup servings into 4 gallon size Ziploc bags. Keep a starter for yourself and give 3 away along with a copy of the recipe and instructions.
4. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
5. To the remaining batter in your bowl add:
3 eggs
1 cup oil
1/2 cup milk
1 cup sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
2 cups flour
1 large or 2 small boxes instant vanilla pudding
6. Grease 2 large loaf pans.
7. Pour mixture evenly into the loaf pans.
8. Bake 1 hour. Cool until bread loosens from pan.
9. Turn onto plate. Serve warm or cold.

Notes: We have used lemon pudding in place of the vanilla pudding and added poppy seeds. So good! You can omit the pudding all together and that turns out great too. You can use a bundt pan instead of loaf pans. Whatever ya like! If you keep a starter for yourself you will be baking every 10 days. You can put the starter in the fridge for later use, or if you are finished with the starter just bake it all up and freeze the bread. It freezes well. The flavor is better the longer you keep the starter.
Enjoy!