Bread making

[samurai]

I have started bread making,and have only done a couple of basic loafs. Anyone got any simple recipes I can try for a very inexperienced baker?

I started cake making to encourage my kids to cook so they could be a little more self suffient when they are adults, and it has grown from there. I don't know why it did'nt start earlier.

[Aphritha]

I used to bake my own breads when my son was a baby, but have gotten out of practice. I can't share any recipes...but I can ask that you share yours! I need a simple one, preferably without eggs, if you know any.

[katie bridgewater]

I was raised on home-made bread, which my dad usually made. He didn't need a recipe and he taught me to make bread by first making me watch him, then making me bake it while he watched me. We never weighed anything, and batches differed subtly, but all were fine. He thought it was more important to understand breadmaking and so he taught me without a rigid recipe/
In a nutshell, you need a small amount of sugar (or honey which I prefer to refined cane sugar) to 'activate' your yeast. Fresh yeast is best, but difficult to get these days. Dried yeast is ok, but the slower the strain, the better. There is an obsession with 'super-fast' yeast these days, but they affect the breakdown of the flour and make bread harder to digest. But I digress. Once the yeast is activated, the flour is added and the dough is proved. Salt is also an important ingredient at this stage, not because of taste, but because it slows the yeast down. The other ingredients added along with the flour are oil (or melted butter) for texture, and water, for consistency. Kneading is also a vital part of the process, because it stretches the gluten in the wheat, making it elastic, so that it will rise easily when pumped up by the gasses released by the yeast. It is important to understand the part of each ingredient and stage in the process. You can experiment with different types of ingredient, and quantities until you find something that works. And everything you make will be edible, as long as it is cooked through.

so try this
1 tsp honey
1 tsp yeast
mix together in warm water (too hot will kill the yeast, too cold will stop it multiplying) and leave until the top is covered in froth.
Add your flour (a couple of pounds usually does it)
Add a little bit of salt
Add a couple of tablespoons of oil or melted fat
slowly mix in water until the dough is firm
leave to rise until doubled in size
'knock back' and knead vigorously for 10 minutes
press into a greased bread tin and leave to rise again, until doubled in size
bake in a hot oven
turn out and stuff your face

The best book on the subject of breadmaking is by Elizabeth David, who explains the process clearly and thoroughly.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/English-Bread-Y ... 0140299742

Be brave, make it by hand and not in a breadmaker, get to know the process, and don't be afraid to experiment - it leads to a deeper understanding than just blindly following an easy recipe that uses superyeast, and only requires one proving. Making bread is a slow and life-enhancing process. Good luck.

[Bracken]

And I love this.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/tonysmumssodabread_67764

It's soda bread, so yeast free and very quick to make. It's delicious, and it lasts a few days and toasts up great. Soda bread usually has to be eaten the day you make it, but this stays moist, probably because of the yoghurt.

Oh, and I can't tell you enough how I agree with Kate about losing the rigid recipe mentality. My scales are crap so weights and measures are intuitive. And experiment with whatever ingredients you feel like or have in the cupboard at the time. It's all good.

bread.jpg (107.71 KiB) Viewed 414 times

[Bracken]

Oh, and just while I'm on the BBC website, THESE are the don.

[Selene]

Reduced to the basics, a classic bread dough is 5 parts flour to 3 parts water, plus yeast and salt. I recommend Michael Ruhlman's Ratio: The Simple Codes Behind the Craft of Everyday Cooking, but you don't have to buy it to read the chapter on bread. Go to http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ratio-Simple-Be ... 1416571728 and type "bread dough" into the search box on the left, then scroll down until you find the link to the chapter that begins on page 5. The author presents a really good overview of why bread doughs work the way they do and how you can vary the basic recipe. You can read most of that chapter (through p. 13) there in the preview section. Ratio is also available as an app for iPhones, iPads and Android devices (not free, though!), if you're into electronic aids in the kitchen.

Another book I really like is Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day; they also have a website with variations on their basic recipe and a lot of helpful tips. This is a great way to have fresh-baked bread every day with very little effort!

[samurai]

There is a good one on bbc by Paul Hollywood(Great British Bake Off fame).

[ShadowCat]

Great ideas above to which I have little to ad. Bread baking is mostly trial and error, getting a feel for your ingredients.
Getting good breadflour is key though, talk to a local farmer or miller if possible.

In Germany to darker sourdoughbreads there are often "breadspices" added. They make for great smelling breads and aid digestion of heavier breads. The spices used are cuminseeds, corianderseeds, fennelseeds, anisseeds, lightly toasted in a dry pan and then ground to a powder. A teaspoon to a kilo of breaddough is a good startingpoint. Also, don't skimp on the salt. A good bread needs its salt. A nice way to add salty flavour without oversalting the bread is using a saltwash (saturated seasaltsolution) on the crust before and after baking.

Also, if using dried yeast, don't let the yeast and the salt come in direct contact. Concentrated salt can kill the yeast.

[ShadowCat]

http://artisanbreadbaking.com/bread/

While I was writing my above message, a friend of mine emailed me this link

[Dysgwr]

My 2 cents on the subject. Not sure If I copied it from the site mentioned by ShadowCat, above. But the date of file creation means Ive had it hanging around for over 3 years now.

Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day.doc

(136.5 KiB) Downloaded 15 times

Enjoy!

[samurai]

Made another loaf but did'nt proof it in bowl(had'nt got a larger bowl) so it went splat. Tasted nice though.

[ShadowCat]

If it went splat if was probably to wet to start with. I can proof my bread straight on the bakingsheet after kneading.

[samurai]

I try again tommorow! May try and do something with raisins and cinnamon in it.

[Michelangela]

I do Portuguese Easter bread every year, as part of my Ostara celebration. It's a pretty easy and forgiving basic recipe - this is a good example: http://www.portuguesegirlcooks.com/2012 ... de-pascoa/ I've never had it fail me, and I'm not an expert bread maker by any means.

My joy is in the decoration of it. I put an extra bit of the dough aside, and role it out thin to cut out decorative designs. These are affixed after the final rise with a little bit of the egg yolk glaze.

These are the last couple years', where I was still experimenting with this technique:

http://s1341.beta.photobucket.com/user/Michelangela19/library/Ostara%20bread

The 2011 has the traditional eggs in it, and I hadn't quite got the knack of the design down yet, so it "tore" as the bread rose. 2012 worked out a lot better, and with the new technique, I was able to get a more detailed design.

Good luck! It's wonderful to "meet" other bread makers!

[ShadowCat]

Here there's a local practice of making "boekmennekes" (bellymen). They are made with a rich breaddough (look for a recipe for brioche), cut into a rough man, with an (hardboiled) egg held in front of the belly. It can easily be adapted to a more pagan motive though.
http://de-gulle-aarde.blogspot.nl/2012/04/paas-mannetjes.html

[ShadowCat]

A friend of my shared this no-knead bread recipe with me today:

500 gram flour (white, wholegrain, lemaire, what-have-you)
one teaspoon salt
7 grams dry yeast
350 ml water

Stir the lot together, let it rise for 13 to 18 degrees at roomtemperature.
Sprinkle flour on your worksurface, pop the dough out of the bowl, push and fold a few times, cover with plastic again and let it rest for an hour.

Preheat the oven to 220 celcius with a ovenproof castiron french oven or other cookpot with a ovenproof lid. When hot, take out the pot, butter it, pop in the dough, bake for half an hour with the lid on and than half an hour with the lid off. Take out when it sounds hollow when struck with a wooden spoon. Let it cool, cut up and enjoy.

[Aphritha]

I decided to quit sitting around an actually bake a loaf...I tried this. I read its a traditional breakfast bread, Albanian style. Its very good, I spread yohgurt on top of it and it makes the perfect breakfast!
I think I erred a bit...I may have added the yeast when the milk was too hot. It didn't rise at first, but did when I was baking it(though I'm not sure it rose to the extent it was supposed to). Even with the mistake, it was still edible. It made a large loaf, and we've been eating it all week.

POGACHA BREAD
•1 cup milk
•1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
•1 package active dry yeast
•2 tablespoons sugar
•5 cups all-purpose flour plus additional for shaping
•1 cup sour cream
•1/4 cup vegetable or canola oil
•1 large egg, slightly beaten
•1 teaspoon salt
Preparation:
1.Scald milk and add butter. Allow to cool to lukewarm. Add yeast and sugar and stir until dissolved.
2.Measure 5 cups flour into work bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Add milk-yeast mixture, sour cream, oil, egg and salt. Mix well.
3.Switch to dough hook and knead on medium-low for about 5 minutes or until dough is smooth and elastic. Turn out into a large greased bowl. Flip dough over to grease both sides, cover and let rise until doubled. See this Quick Tip for faster rising.
4.Heat oven to 350 degrees. Punch down dough and place in a 10-inch round greased pan with high sides (about 3 inches) or handshape into a 10-inch round and place on a parchment-lined baking sheet.
5.Using a sharp knife or a lame, slash top of dough three times. Some make an "X" on top. Bake about 1 hour or until instant-read thermometer registers 190 degrees. Remove from oven and place on cooling rack.

[Kris Hughes]

I started baking my own bread within the past year. I found this website a really good resource http://www.thefreshloaf.com/
there is even a little breadmaking course on there.

I was looking to learn to bake good wholegrain bread that uses a variety of grains. That has been a challenge. Fortunately both my partner and I like fairly heavy bread, and I've arrived at a loaf that's not quite my ideal, but we have been enjoying it for quite awhile now. I don't have a reliable kitchen scales, so I can only offer the recipe in US cups/spoons. This makes 2 loaves -

Part 1
1 cup wholewheat flour
1 cup barley flour
1 cup rye flour
1 cup buckwheat flour
1 cup old fashioned oats
2 1/2 cups hot water

Mix all this together in a bowl and cover it. (It will probably be hard to mix, don't worry.) Let it stand for an hour or two. Wholegrain flour just does better if it has time to absorb the water for longer...

Part 2
2 cups all purpose/unbleached flour
3 teaspoons salt
3/4 cup raw sunflower seeds (not in the shells!)
4 teaspoons active dry yeast
1 tablespoon honey
1 cup warm water

Add the white flour, sunflower seeds and salt to the bowl that contains the soaked flour, don't worry about trying to mix it yet.. Put the warm water and honey in a cup or something and sprinkle the yeast in. After five minutes or so it should be getting a little frothy and this lets you know that your yeast is not dead or something, without ruining all that flour. Add this to the big bowl of ingredients, and make sure you get it all off the sides of the cup and into your mix. Work this mixture around in the bowl until it' s sticking together pretty well. Then turn it out onto a floured board and start kneading it. If some unmixed bits are evident, don't worry, the kneading will sort that out.

This is where you may find that your mixture is too wet. I live in an arid climate, so this may have been too much water if you live in a much wetter climate, or your flour was a bit different than mine or whatever. It the mixture sticks to your countertop and hands just a little, then it's probably about right, and you can add just a little more flour to the surface once in awhile to make life easier. It it's an awful, sticky mess, then you can work in a significantly greater amount of flour until it's about right, either by scraping it all back into the bowl, or while you knead. (This is part the trial - error - experience part of bread making!)
Knead this for about 10 minutes, and put it in an oiled bowl, covered, in a warm place. (I preheat my over to a really low temperature for a couple of minutes, then turn it off, and put it in there.) This type of bread will rise faster than more conventional bread - your ball of dough should be about double - probably in 30 minutes to and hour.)

I punch the excess air out of this ball of dough at that point, divide it into two oiled loaf pans, and cover them, and leave to rise again in a warm place. Usually this takes slightly less time. It's easy to "over proof" this kind of bread - which means that the yeast has peaked and started to die off. So check it often! 30 minutes might well do it. I then slash the tops of my loaves with a very sharp knife. I just take the cover off the loaves and turn the oven on, letting it heat up slowly to 350 F. They are usually done in about 35 - 40 minutes. They won't get particularly brown, so the way to see if they're done is to turn a loaf out of the pan and tap the bottom. If it sounds kind of hollow, you're fine!

This won't get really tall like bread from the store or a bakery. It will be 1/2 to 2/3 as tall as a normal sandwich bread, but we like it....

If anyone in the UK wants a translation of any US ingredients, let me know, I used to live there and some things have different names. I'm afraid you're on your own with the cups things though...

[samurai]

Aphrintha,gonna give your recipe a go,once walked the dogs. Minus the cream as I have none.

[Rem]

I love the idea of this thread. I need to get back into bread making. Last year I made a few loaves but then lost track.
As I am away from my recipe folder at home at the moment the only one in my book at hand is a pizza recipe which is a quick 20min rise compared to the bread dough ones. My grandmother loves it and they only have fresh pizza when I visit so I took it along. If anyone would ever like that let me know. Nothing special, but tasty if you like a thicker base.
Bread recipes I shall try and add when I am back home in my kitchen including trying some of the ones mentioned here. Thank you for sharing.