Has anyone got a foolproof recipe for making plain white bread?
I've tried Jamie Oliver, Delia Smith, both for a bread machine &
by hand, but What a disaster. They've all turned out like bricks :-[
Many thanks in advance,
gertie :)
Its all in the flour , we have been using Wessex Mill flour for several years in a bread machine , bricks could mean your killing the yeast , water too hot or no yeast action where water too cold.
Been having the same trouble myself.
I've been looking at this site, there are lots of hints and tips.
http://bakingmad.com/tips/bakingbread
I've got a couple of things to try differently next time around!!
Why don't you try the packets of flour with the yeast already added, straight forward just add water, from start to finish it takes me one and a half hours to turn out delicious bread,
I put 320 +ml of warm water in and a tbs of olive oil. Then 500g of strong bread flour. Then a sachet of dried yeast and a tsp 0f salt in the opposite corner so the salt and yeast are away from each other. Works every time.
Sometimes I put as much as 360ml of water. More rather than less.
ETA this is a bread machine recipe.
I have a recipe that I was given on A4A a few years ago that never fails..
SCOTTISH BAP OR FLAT LOAF
1lb plain flour
1 level teaspoon salt
2oz butter
1/2oz fresh yeast
1/4 pint lukewarm water
1/4 pint lukewarm milk
1) sift flour and salt into bowl then rub in butter.
2) Mix yeast with the water and milk.
3) Add all at once to dry ingredients, mix to a firm dough, adding a little extra flour if necessary, until dough leaves dies of bowl clean.
4) Turn out onto a lightly floured board. Knead 10 mins (or until smooth and elasticy).
5) Cover and leave to rise until dough doubles in size.
6) Turn out onto a floured board, knead lightly. Divide dough into 10 equal pieces, roll each into 1/2" thick ovals.
7) Transfer to al lightly buttered and floured baking tray, dredge with flour.
8) Cover and leave to rise until double in size.
9) Bake just above centre of a fairly hot over (200C) for 15-20 minutes, covered with a dry tea towel.
I think the secret for soft rolls is, when cooling on a wire rack to cover with a dry tea towel.
In both cases I use the food mixer for the initial mixing/lneading.
Both freeze well, so you can use as many cobs/baps as you need at anytime.
I've been making most of my bread for over 30 years. I do all sorts of tweaks, but my basic recipe is
1.5 lb white bread flour (I use Tesco own brand)
3 eggspoons salt
sachet (7g) tesco yeast
3/4 pint water
Mix, adding a bit of flour if it's sticky, knead, leave to rise about 1 hour, shape as required (I tend to make rolls), second rise about 20 mins, then cook at 200 (think that's Mark 7) and bob's your uncle. Breadmaking is not magic, but experience helps -and strong wrists for kneading! The most important thing is not to try baking it if it hasn't risen. Unless you like the bricks.
My recipe, 500g flour, 300 mls warm water, 15g fresh yeast, 10g salt, 10g sugar and a thingy of butter or a sploosh of olive oil. Never, ever had a duff loaf. I do prefer fresh yeast, and it is cheaper than the dried stuff. I make 2 every Friday for our weekend - I think hubby would leave me if I didn't. ;D
I just made some bread yesterday and it turned out fine. The recipe was:
220ml water or half and half with milk if you like softer bread
400g strong flour
2 tabs oil in the water
1 teas salt
1 teas sugar
1 teas baker's yeast that went in the water about 15 minutes before the dry stuff.
I also put a little sour dough starter in but it's not strictly necessary
The important thing is to look at the dough once it has been well mixed in the machine. If it is not mixing properly, it's too dry so add water a teaspoon at a time until it is a soft dough. If it is sticking all over the bowl, it's too wet so add a little flour until the dough is a soft dough that has a smooth surface. After the kneading cycle it should be a roundish lump sitting in the tin. That means it is the right balance of flour and water and should give a correct texture.
Hope this helps.
Just to add, I put the water in the tin first followed by the lump of yeast. I then cover the liquid and yeast with the flour. The salt, sugar and fat go on the top. I seem to remember from school that if the yeast comes into contact with the salt to soon, it can kill it.
I agree with antipodes, I never just leave the machine to it, and I don't use the machine to cook the bread. I let it do all of the kneading and the first prove, I then tip it out, give it a good knock back, put into a loaf tin, let it rise for another hour then bake for 40 mins at 170 degrees. I then tip it out of it's tin, turn the oven off, but return the loaf to the cooling oven with the door ajar to crispen up the whole crust.
I must admit that I never got on with my bread machine and ditched it in favour of hand kneeding...At least this way I can tell if my bread is too dry or too wet as I kneed
I pretty much follow Mrs Ava's receipe below and the best thing is that it is really eazy to scale up (or down) but I have produced a few duffers in my time!! I add a little less salt and sugar though..
10 parts flour
6 parts water (I like a milk water mix)
2% fresh yeast (1 % dry)
1.5% salt
and a very precise glug of olive oil..
Recently I have into sour dough - any other sour bakers out there???
Quote from: gertie50 on February 26, 2012, 21:08:35
Has anyone got a foolproof recipe for making plain white bread?
I've tried Jamie Oliver, Delia Smith, both for a bread machine &
by hand, but What a disaster. They've all turned out like bricks :-[
Many thanks in advance,
gertie :)
If Delia and Jamie don't succeed, then I don't think any other recipe, however excellent, is going to be your salvation.
Something is wrong with your ingredients. It's unlikely to be the proving or oven temperatures, since the bread machine will work, even if your oven is a bit idiosyncratic!
It may be the flour (not "strong" enough, or not fresh). It may be the yeast. Or maybe the water's too hot.
I got one of these for xmas
http://bakerybits.co.uk/La-Cloche-Baking-Dome-P2026497.aspx
It helps make excellent bread - my loafs really get a great oven lift..
Also - try some fresh yeast. I have been using dreid yeast for ages and only just realised that I didnt have "fast acting" yeast and that it needed to be activated for 10-15 mins before use. Fresh yeast gives a nice quick rise if it is really fresh.
I too have been making the family bread for about 40 years, taking over from my father who started in the late 1940s. Always by hand. I think it started off as "The Grant Loaf" but we adapted it.
About 15 years ago I changed over to dried yeast in packets that does not need to be placed in a bowl of warm water and sugar to grow (though that in itself is fascinating).
It is wonderful. You just chuck it in with the flour and salt, add warm water, and it is impossible to fail. I only do a single rise (mix everything up and knead a little, plop lumps into tins lined with butter and sesame seed - though sesame is not necessary, of course, but gives lovely flavour to the bread and helps it to slither out of the tin) and cook it in a hot oven lowered after about 10 minutes.
I am also a fan of the small packets in supermarkets labelled "ciabatta" that can make rolls or loaves or pizza bases by simply adding warm water and a litle olive oil. They are wonderful. Recently learned that you can make "garlic knots" by rolling out snakes, twisting them into knots, baking quickly, and drenching them with a garlic/butter/parsley sauce made quickly while they are cooking.
Have just remembered to say that when I take the loaves outof the tins, I put them back into the oven upside down on a baking sheet to singe a bit.
(Whispers - my husband makes this bread - we take it in turns - but does not do this final step, and his loaves are always a bit soggy in the middle.....)
BarriedaleNick, I do keep a sourdough starter going most of the time. I never used to, then was inspired by the wonderful Handmade Loaf book by Dan Lepard, a method which in the end I found too complicated and wasteful. Then by the easier version in Nigella's Godess book. Now I do my own version, which involves keeping a small lump of the finished dough, before it goes into the oven (I have to try very very hard to remember to do this!), mix it with some more flour and a little water, and get it going again over two or three days. Either it then goes into the fridge or I continue to add to it for the next batch if it is in a couple of days. If it is in the fridge I have to remember to get it out several days before my next breadmaking in order to re-activate it again. This method is tolerant, and doesn't involve throwing half of the starter away each time, which I can't bear to do - so wasteful! If it is working well, I use no yeast, or hardly any, but sometimes I find it needs a little help.
I've been making our bread for 35 years, since the bread strike in 1976, was it? Always used to use fresh yeast, when I could buy a kilo at a time and froze it in 2oz lumps. But when the kids left home I made less bread so changed to quick yeast.
Oh yes, I remember the bread strike in the mid 70s! My children were 6, 7 and 8. I had frozen fresh yeast and sailed through it. A chemist friend also cultured yeast on lab radiators and let us have some.
I am a fan of keeping spare dough in the fridge for a week or 2 or 3, rolling it out into roundish shapes, and frying it in dry flat pan for puffing up into flat breads/pitta/whatever you like to call it.
looks like my problem was using easy blend yeast. It only needs one kneading and one rising. (I did 2 of each) So I am going to try this next time. Allinsons have recommended this easy loaf to start with..
http://www.bakingmad.com/recipes/grainsandseedbreads/very-simple-easy-bake-wholemeal-loaf-
errmm.. have some fresh yeast bought more than a week ago with the sell by date of 22nd Feb. Is this still ok to use? I did have good intentions, really! ::) ::)
The yeast question is important. I only use fast action yeast if I make the bread in the machine from a to z. As I often don't, but take the bread out and get it to rise more and then cook it in the oven, I found that I get a better result with "Traditional" dry yeast that you have to activate first. I just put the liquid in a few minutes ahead of time and the yeast so it dissolves and starts to warm up. I find that it rises much better. Sometimes I make brioche that I leave overnight in the cooler pantry, and I wouldn't use fast action yeast for that.
I often make bread and have found the recipe on the bag of Allinsons flour to be good. Think the secret of hand made bread is all in the kneading. When you think you have done enough, do the same time again!
I think most failures are because most people are in too much of a hurry. I often leave mine to prove overnight in their tins in the fridge. My wrists are stronger in the evenings and then i go to bed and chuck in all in the oven in the morning.My first mix-up is usually just that now and I don't knead properly until its going into the tins.
If bread is sad in the middle it needs longer in the oven. An hour I find is usually ok and I do 4-5 Loaves at a time.
I think a breadmachine would have to be excellent to tempt me from handbaking despite now having R. Arthritis in my hands.
My first loaves were made as we watched the men first walking on the moon [was it 1969?] and I've continued ever since... ;)
Well, I am an awful hurry when I make it by hand. 20 minutes at a run from assembling flour (mixed white and wholemeal, both strong, about 3.5lb plus 2 packets of quick acting dried yeast), salt, warm water, and into the tins for a single rise. Two or three hours later into hot oven, turned out after about 40 minutes, upside down, onto baking sheet to singe the bottoms. Tins are lined with sesame seeds to help the bread slip out, and the tops of the loaves are stroked with milk plus pumpkin seeds for added flavour.