Home baked bread tastes better and is healthier than store bought bread. Many home bakers are intimidated with baking their own bread, but this recipe makes bread easy.
There is nothing like a fresh loaf of bread to make the home smell wonderful. But beyond the delicious aroma, home baked bread doesn't contain any additives or preservatives, making it a healthy alternative to store bought breads. Additionally, homemade bread typically costs less to make than commercial bread does to buy.
Ingredients For Homemade Bread:
- 3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp instant yeast
- 1 1/4 tsp salt
- 3 Tablespoons sugar
- 4 Tablespoons butter, softened to room temp
- 1/4 cup nonfat dry milk
- 1/4 cup mashed potato flakes
- 1 1/8 cups lukewarm water
Directions For Homemade Bread:
- Pour the yeast into the warm water. Add a pinch of sugar, and stir. Cover with plastic and set aside.
- In a large mixing bowl, combine the remaining ingredients. Then add the yeast mixture. Stir the bread dough into a ball. It will not be entirely cohesive, but rather a little shaggy in appearance.
- Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Knead the dough by hand for six to eight minutes, until the bread dough is smooth and supple.
- Place the homemade bread dough into a large, lightly greased bowl. Cover with plastic wrap, and the bread dough sit in a warm, draft-free place. Allow the dough to rise one hour, or until the homemade dough has nearly doubled in size.
- Turn the dough out on the counter, and shape into an 8-inch loaf. Place in a lightly-greased bread loaf pan and allow the bread to rise in the pan for about an hour, or until the dough has crowned about one inch over the top of the bread pan.
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
- Bake approximately 330-35 minutes, or until the internal temperature of the loaf reaches 190 degrees.
- Remove the bread from the pan and allow it to cool completely before slicing.
Home Baked Bread Tips
- When slicing home baked bread, start slicing from the center. Then, when storing the bread, push the two open ends together before placing in a bread bag. This prevents the cut ends of the bread from becoming dry.
- When baked properly, the loaf of homemade bread will sound hollow when tapped on the bottom.
- The mashed potato flakes in the recipe help to add moisture and starch to the loaf of bread. Instead of using additional flour, which will dry out the homemade bread recipe, the mashed potatoes provide texture without the additional dryness.
This easy homemade bread recipe can be doubled to make more than one loaf at a time. Additionally, it can be frozen after it has been shaped, to be used at another time. To use the homemade bread after freezing, simply place the frozen bread dough in a lightly greased loaf pan and let it rise above the pan. Then proceed with the recipe from step six onward.
The copyright of the article The Best White Bread Recipe in Breads & Muffins is owned by Annalise Kaylor. Permission to republish The Best White Bread Recipe in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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