So you love to bake your own bread. We all do. I love the aroma in the kitchen while baking. Baking is a stress buster and when I am baking I am just myself.
My first few attempts at baking my own bread were unsuccessful because I was completely unaware of kneading sticky dough process. I kneaded my dough the way I knead them for making chapatis, but that wasn’t enough.
I needed the basic bread dough recipe to get better loaves from the oven. Making dough is the most important part of any baking.
Basic Bread Dough Recipe
One of the most problematic areas of kneading dough of bread is the stickiness of the dough. The art is to deal with the stickiness and knead the dough properly.
The more you knead the better it is. A soft dough will help you give the desired shapes to your bread. If the dough is not prepared well, the final product also does not taste/look good.
How to make bread dough?
Once you master the homemade bread dough kneading process, bread baking becomes so very easy. The joy of eating your own baked chemical and preservatives free bread is incomparable.
Follow this stepwise basic bread dough recipe and it will help you get a soft and non-sticky dough. Once you get the dough, follow my recipes to make white sandwich bread.
Over to recipe now process of making bread.
PS: Use conversion table to switch recipe between grams and cups.
Want to get growing?
Starting and growing a business can be hard, and sometimes you might feel stuck. Our weekly newsletter gets delivered to over 30,000 people each week to help them grow. We'd love to help you, too. Subscribe now, it's free.
We respect your privacy and promise to only send you the freshest baking news. No spam, ever. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Activating the yeast
Take a dry bowl, add yeast, sugar and lukewarm water and stir it well. Cover the mixture and keep it in a dry place for about 15 min or till the yeast gets activated as shown in the pic below.
Making the dough
Take a fresh bowl of a large size. Add all purpose flour and salt. Add the activated yeast to the flour and mix it well.
Kneading process
Initially, the dough will be sticky. Time to show your muscles. Take a little bit of butter/ Oil on your hands and knead the dough for about 7 to 10 minutes using pull and fold method. The dough will still be a little sticky but will become very soft.
First Rise
Place the dough into a greased pan and cover it with a cling wrap or Kitchen towel. Keep this pan in some warm place until the dough doubles in Volume.
Second rise
Once the dough doubles in volume take it out on a lightly dusted surface, dusted with flour, Punch it to release the air and knead it for another 5 minutes.
You now need to shape the bread in the desired shape. You can visit my list of recipes to see various shapes of bread you can bake.
Finally shape it in the desired shape, cover it with a clean wrap and keep it for the second rise.
Ingredients
- 400 gm All Purpose Flour
- 5 gm Instant Yeast
- 1 tsp Sugar
- 1 tsp Salt
- 200 ml Luke Warm Water 1/2 cup = 120 ml
- 2 tsp Butter You can use Oil as well
Instructions
Activating the Yeast
- Take a dry bowl, add yeast, sugar and lukewarm water and stir it well.
- Cover the mixture and keep it in a dry place for about 15 min or till the yeast gets activated as shown in the pic below.
Making the Dough
- Take a fresh bowl of a large size. Add all purpose flour and salt.
- Add the activated yeast to the flour and mix it well.
Kneading Process
- Initially the dough will be sticky. Time to show your muscles.
- Take a little bit of butter/ Oil on your hands and knead the dough for about 7 to 10 minutes using pull and fold method. The dough will still be a little sticky, but will become very soft.
First Rise
- Place the dough into a greased pan and cover it with a cling wrap or kitchen towel.
- Keep this pan in some warm place until the dough doubles in the volume.
Second Rise
- Once the dough doubles in volume take it out on a lightly dusted surface, dusted with flour, Punch it to release the air and knead it for another 5 minutes.
- You now need to shape the bread in a desired shape. You can visit my list of recipes to see various shapes of bread you can bake.
- Finally shape it in a desired shape, cover it with a clean wrap and keep it for the second rise.
Hi mam… can you guide as of where to place the bread loaf pan and settings ..i have toaster oven black decker
Hi Keerthi,
Settings are given in the recipe. You place the pan in the middle rack.
Thanks
Sonia
Hi Sonia, read a lot of your recipes and also techniques it is so helpful..and your recipes are simple and so clear . It wil be a privilege to learn from you…..i have failed many a times for bun making…the base crust is becoming very hard..pls tel me should I bake breads on top n bottom heat or just bottom ?? I am going wrong somewhere..but I truly want to make n bake well…it wil be a.dream.come.true . Pls help n guide with your experience. It is very kind of you to share this all . Thank you 😊👍
Thanks n regards,
Heer
Dear Heer,
Use both the coils for baking bread and place the baking tray on the middle rack.
Happy Baking!
What is thw tempreture to bake bread and the baking time please
Please refer to the recipe notes.
100 gm all purpose flour means how many cup (measuring cup)?
Please use conversion table and here is the link to that Use Conversion Table to convert grams to cups .
Hello Sonia ,
You are a rockstar , thank you is the small word. I tried baking bread but all time I failed and tdy I tried your recipe and it rocked though I don’t have bread baking Tin so had to compromise with the shape else it rocked. You saved me as we aren’t buying breads from outside due to covid 19. My kids loved it. Thanks again.
Once all is sorted will join your baking classes am from Gurugram.
Thank you Kirti for such an awesome feedback.
Happy Baking!
Hello Sonia
I want to know that in this recipe its 5gm Instant Yeast but I have active dry yeast so how much should be the quantity.How should be calculate the yeast?
Pooja,
Active dry yeast and instant yeast are interchangeable. so you can use any of these in same amount.
Sonia
Hi I have a dough kneader. Can we follow the same recipe
Absolutely.
Thanks
Sonia
Hi Sonia Wen I take out d bread from d oven the top is very hard not like d market kind soft and spongi pls tell where I m going wrong.
Ruchi,
There are few reasons that can make crust hard, like
1. If the temperature inside the chamber was too high.
2. The dough was too hard.
3. You baked the bread more than required.
Also brush the bread with butter after baking and let it rest for minimum 2 hrs. This will help to soften the crust.
Happy Baking
Sonia
I have not yet received the free ebook
Jyoti, you get an email with the download link. Please look for the email. If the email is not in your inbox, please check your spam and junk folder too.
Regards
Sonia
hi mam
In this recipe you have used 200 ml water for 400 APF
and in multigrain bread you have used 380 ml for 400 gms of flour ….
does multigrain flour soak more water?
also after first proofing
dough is still sticky cant handle very loose .. where m i making mistake ??
Anuprita,
Multigrain flour absorbs more water than APF. So the difference in water measurements.
If you find the dough sticky, reduce the water amount next time. Hope it helps.
Happy Baking
Sonia
Hi hum abhi bread first time bana rahe hain please aap bataiyegi ki pull and fold method kya hota hain thanks
Sweta, this is a technique with which the dough is kneaded. So its like stretching the dough from one hand and then folding one half on the other and then repeating this process for about 10 minutes.
Thanks😊
Totally agree with you Sonia
Telling the mind to shut up is the key to a happy life
:).
Hi Sonia, Can we use normal yeast instead of instant and dry yeast? If so, do you have any recipe of that?
Hi Indarni,
There are three types of yeast that I am aware of viz. Instant yeast, dry yeast and fresh yeast. You can use either of them in the recipe using the following ratio.
Fresh yeast : dry yeast : instant yeast
1 : 1/2 : 1/3
For example, if the recipe calls for 15gms of fresh yeast than alternatively you can use 7gms of dry yeast or 5 gms of instant yeast in the same recipe.
Let me know if you still have more questions.
Sonia
I am waiting for the day when I will have courage to do this….its like every weekend I will give a thought and then give up. Hope next weekend.
Hello Kirti,
There is no better way to do it “Now”. I understand when you talk about courage. I have gone through the Sine Wave of courage. I realized that it is the mind which deviates us. Tell your mind to “Shut-Up”, you will see your courage rising. 🙂
Regards
Sonia