How to Bake Bread in the Oven

Watch as I attempt to bake bread for the first time. Easy recipe but I'm fairly sure something went wrong. Anyway, follow the steps and see if yours turns out any better!

Comments

[ryadia]

Without trying to insult you or knock other people's recipe, I have some advice that will guarantee a better bake. You don't even need to "follow any rules" either.

1. Sugar only softens bread. An example is the somewhat soggy rolls you get from many of the "foot long roll" take-away places. Soft because of sugar used in the mix. Soft bread is more likely to break your teeth than any other bread.

2. Using tepid water is a good idea but please... Dissolve the yeast in it first. For a 1 kilogram loaf, 1½ teaspoons is quite enough yeast. Using more might make the bread rise faster and higher but it will also result in larger air pockets that can often ruin an otherwise nice looking loaf.

2.Salt is an absolutely essential ingredient for all bread. It helps create the texture and really does add to the flavor and rise of a loaf. Add a teaspoon of sugar if you want to have softer crust but I like a more natural and crisper toasting bread so I leave sugar out. You can make an excellent sour dough bread using nothing more than stone ground flour, water, salt and fermented apple.

3. Bakers flour is also essential. I haven't a clue what it is that makes if different from other types of wheat flour but it does make a better bread when you use yeast.

4. Lastly, a product known as 'Bread Improver' will help avoid massive air bubbles in the finished loaf and allow you to use more yeast if you like a light ,fluffy loaf.

5. Is about how you make a loaf of the right volume for the amount of flour used. Kneading bread will certainly test your muscles so if you have a mixer with dough hooks, definitely use it to blend the mixture. The more you kneed a mix, the better the loaf will be. I often kneed a mix 3 times, depending on the season of the year and type of bread. I live in Sub-Tropical Australia. where humidity hovers around 80% to 90% all year round.

I taught myself to make bread from what I found in the Old Testament of the Bible. After a heart attack and by-pass operation I figured diet, booze, stress and smoking was the cause.

That was when I sought out the Jewish "Kosher" diet. Their food laws made good sense to me. That was over 20 years ago. I don't do any other exercise, just bread kneading to control weight, fitness and wellness with food intake and the exercise of growing and cooking.

Since finding a recipe for sour dough bread, I have eaten no other bread that I haven't kneaded with my own hands... And a few other foods often described as crazy.

Hopefully by knowing how you mix your ingredients and why you need certain of them, you'll get as hooked as me on home cooked food for health living.