Herb Rolls

     I was in the grocery and like most people I can't pass up a bargain.  In a cart there were bread mixes for a dollar.  For only one single dollar I could buy a mix that would fill my home with the wonderful aroma of bread baking. How could I possibly resist.  But is the really baking bread?  Is it cheating?  I still need yeast.  It still has to rise.  it still must be shaped.  Yes, it is indeed it is real bread.
     The mix was a herb bread mix that had directions for both bread machine and traditional methods.  There was one big change that I made in the recipe.  I did not use the yeast that came with the mix.  I have become a huge fan of Saf-Yeast Instant Yeast.  I can't find it locally, but King Arthur sells it on the web.  Not having to bloom the yeast is a real benefit.  It is great to be able to just add the yeast to the flour and not have to worry about blooming the yeast - instant yeast just makes bread easier.
     There were no directions for rolls, but in my past life I would use my bread machine to make dough for rolls.  I remember making clover leaf rolls.  Instead of putting the dough in a loaf pan, I rolled three little balls of equal weight (a total of two ounces per roll) and placed them in a cup cake tin.  Twenty minutes later we were eating wonderfully herb scented rolls, hot from the oven.
     Each week when I bake, I take a photo of the finished product.  (When I say I take a picture I actually mean Wayne takes a picture.)  When I made the herb rolls, I decided to use my mimi's china.  I don't know how old her china is, but my mother remembered eating from it when she was a young adult in the 1940's.  After Katrina when we went to out home in Meraux, it was utter devastation, a story well-known by thousands.  One of the things we were able to find and recover was my grandmother's china.  We were able to salvage our china as well (which is now our everyday dishes), but there is something about our heritage china that speaks directly to the southern woman's soul.  The dishes brought back childhood memories of Sunday dinner at Mimi's house.  I can still see Grandma (my great-grandmother), Aunt Louiska, Mimi and my mother at the table.  All of these women are now gone, but they have all shaped me into the woman I am today.  At times I see so much of my mother in me it's almost scary.   I can see my brother arguing with Grandma over who would get the chicken wings off the tender baked chicken warm from the oven.  My brother really was not a wing fan, he just wanted to give Grandma a little competition.  There would be Dubon Petite Pois Peas, my Aunt Louiska's macaroni and cheese (made with long macaroni, of course), and sliced white bread.  Not long after dinner would come the enchanting chimes from, "THE ICE CREAM  MAN."  Grandma would call my brother and I to her.  She would pull out her coin purse and give us each a quarter.  With that quarter we could get a giant ice cream sandwich or an enormous ice cream drum stick.  After Ed Sullivan, Mama would load us into the car and take us home.
     China is one of those things that somehow always seems to reassure you that everything will be okay.  Finding that china after Katrina was like hearing Mimi say, "This china survived Betsy and Katrina.  You will get through this too.  Everything will be okay.  This is just one of life's little challenges.  You are strong, be a woman and deal with it."  China is a magical thing.