Our Daily Bread

I never understood the concept of daily bread when I was younger. I figured it was just a quaint bit of language held over from days before Sara Lee and her 24 slice wonder bread. Encapsulated in fairy tale rhymes and standardized prayers, "Give us this day our daily bread..." but what did it really mean?
Becky started me thinking about it. She had just moved in with her sister and mom and was baking for two little toddlers, at least 3 loaves a week. She called it her daily bread and gave me her recipe which I tried a few times while I was unemployed and pregnant. Baby + two moves later and the baking stuff is once again unpacked and we're trying to bake daily bread again. This time though, it's Dave at home doing the alchemy.
He is doing a great job of course, and as I expected, he found his own way. We're using a no-knead recipe from Mother Earth News. It mixes up a large supply of wet dough that is supposed to make four 1 pound loaves. He's tried it with white flour and wheat flour and now we're playing around with percentages of both. It's a pretty forgiving recipe and even the times we thought it was screwed up beyond redemption, a little additional flour and it baked up great.
It's beautiful, it tastes great, it's easy to make, and best of all it only has 4 ingredients, water-yeast-sugar-flour. No weird preservatives, no crazy chemicals or processed foods. Just simple and nutritious. Plus, it costs less than a buck a loaf, which can't be beat at the grocery store.

He makes a new loaf every other day at least. So, we have our daily bread and it means a lot more than I ever imagined.