One of the easiest homemade recipes you can master that will benefit your health is to make your own bread. It takes just a few tries at first to get familiar with the recipe, the method, and what to watch for in the texture and technique. In this post, I’m sharing why you’re going to want to learn this skill, and the recipe we use at home for some of the best classic bread we’ve ever had.
Why We Stopped Buying Store-Bought Bread
The short answer is, it was becoming too expensive. We had a child with a wheat allergy early on, and we had been buying gluten-free bread. If we bought regular bread, we opted for the organic brands to hopefully avoid many of the chemical and pesticide ingredients that today’s bread products contain. We just could’t keep paying so much for the quality we wanted. So, I learned to make bread, and we never went back.
What You Sacrifice In Health For Grocery Store Convenience
Store-bought bread is loaded with preservatives and additives that keep it from spoiling while it sits on the grocery store shelves. If food is made with chemicals that unnaturally delay the decomposing process, image what that does to the insides of your body when you consume it! It makes it difficult for your body to absorb and utilize any beneficial vitamins, minerals, and nutrients of the food. Many of those additives have destructive effects on the lining of the stomach and intestines as well.
Bread Is Just The Beginning
I’m telling you right now, be prepared for the pride that comes along with mastering this skill! Before you know it, you’ll feel confident in trying to make other flour-based foods on your own and kick those store-bought brands to the curb! (English muffins, bagels, tortillas, pie crusts, dinner rolls, pasta noodles, waffles, pancakes, muffins, donuts, desserts… the list is endless)!
Give Yourself a Chance – Practice Pays Off
If you’ve never made bread by hand before, it is a little bit of a learning curve, but nothing you can’t accomplish! I have left loaves to overproof and deflate, I have forgotten to grease my bread pans, resulting in bread that I had to destroy to get it out of the pans! I have even forgotten about loaves in the oven when going out for a walk. But once you get a feel for the method, you’ll know that in about 2 hours, you’ll have two incredibly delicious, homemade loaves of bread that will leave your home smelling heavenly! It’s worth the effort to learn this skill!
So, let’s get started! If you end up making our recipe and find yourself in love with homemade bread, leave a comment below!
Easy Homemade Bread
Equipment
- 1 Stand Mixer With Bread Hook Attachment
- 2 Standard Size Bread Loaf Dishes This recipe has worked with glass or ceramic bread loaf-sized dishes.
Ingredients
Yeast Activation
- 2 cups spring water
- 2 tsp granulated sugar
- 2 ¼ tsp instant dry yeast
Bread Dough Ingredients
- 1 TBS olive oil (plus extra for coating the dough for its first rise)
- 2 tsp sea salt
- 5-6 cups all-purpose flour (unbleached) (plus a bit extra for dusting)
- 2-3 TBS Butter (used to grease the loaf dishes, and to melt on the top of the hot fresh loaves)
Instructions
- Prep your oven for rise time and your stand mixing bowl for activating the yeast. Turn your oven on to the lowest setting. (You will turn it off when the dough is prepared.) Fill your mixing bowl with hot water and let it sit while gathering the rest of your ingredients.
- Next, activate your yeast. I heat up the 2 cups of water in the microwave for 1 minute 30 seconds. You want your water to be warm to the touch but not steaming hot. Empty the mixing bowl water. Add into the warmed empty mixing bowl the yeast, sugar, and the heated 2 cups of water. Set a timer for 5 minutes while the yeast activates.
- Now, your yeast mixture should look foamy on the top. Add in the salt, olive oil, and 4 cups of the flour. Mix with the dough hook. At this point, the dough will look really wet and sticky. We want to start out with less flour and work up to the right texture for the bread without over-flouring... that would make the bread really dense and hard.
- Once that is mixed in, you will start adding the remainder of the flour about 2 TBS at a time. What you want to see is the dough begin to form into a ball that isn't sticking to the sides of your mixing bowl. Normally, I use about 5½ cups total.
- Once your dough is formed, let the mixer knead for about 5 minutes. Turn the oven off at this point.
- Now, your dough is ready for the first rise. Use some olive oil (about 1-2 TBS) to just coat the dough, turning it to coat on all sides. You can leave it in the mixing bowl and cover the bowl with a thin tea towel or flour sack towel. Put it into the off, warmed oven for 45 minutes.
- Next, dust a work surface with a little flour. Prepare your loaf dishes buy greasing with butter. This will help your loaves get a nice golden soft outer texture and prevent them from sticking to the dish.
- Dump the risen dough onto your floured surface and divide into two equal amounts. Gently fold the outer edges into the center of each of the dough balls about 5-10 times. Sometimes, gently rolling the dough up into a large log shape is helpful. Now pinch any loose open parts of the dough closed and turn them over and place into the greased loaf dishes - smooth side up. Cover both with the tea towel again and return to the off oven for the second rise - about 45 minutes to an hour. What you are looking for is the bread dough to be just risen up to the top of the loaf dish.
- Finally, we are ready to bake! Remove the loaves from the oven and uncover. Preheat the oven to 360℉. Once preheated, bake your loaves for 35 minutes.
- Remove from the oven. Rub a TBS of butter over the top of each hot loaf and allow it to melt. Let your loaves cool in the dishes for 5 minutes and then remove to a wire rack to cool completely. The bread center will be a little doughy if cut into before cooling - some don't mind that and some can't wait until the loaf cools!!!
- Bread will store covered at room temperature for about 3-5 days. We wrap it in plastic wrap or in a reused plastic bread bag to keep it from hardening. This bread toasts beautifully as well.