Food life

Let’s talk about bread.

Most people are scared of bread, the ingredient of yeast giving baking nightmares.  Honestly, bread is NOT all that scary – it’s just about using an extremely simple recipe and a bit of practice.

For the 3 of us, I bake once a week – that’s it!  Around 15 minutes total of effort for the whole week – I think almost anyone can manage that.  My recipe makes 3 good-sized loaves of about 16-18 slices each (cut conservatively).  Warning: if they’re anything like my husband, men are a bit useless at cutting bread, so cut all the loaves yourself in advance and then they won’t mess up your slice count!  Also, bread slices much easier when cool/cold (we store ours in the fridge).

Easiest bread recipe:

1500g bread flour (your choice: either all white, or I do 50/50 white/wholemeal)

15g dried yeast

1 tsp sugar

10g salt

1.5 (British) pints warm water

Measure out ¼ pint warm water into and dissolve the sugar into it.  Thoroughly mix in your yeast (NOT the fast-action kind) and place in a warm area* for 10-15 minutes until the mixture forms a 0.5-1 inch foamy head.

In the meantime, dump all your flour into a large mixing bowl.  Add the salt and mix in.  I like to warm my flour as I think it gives a better rise, but if you have a really warm house then you don’t have to.  I microwave on LOW for 1 minute, stir, microwave 1 more minute.  You could also put the bowl in a low oven for a few minutes instead.

Once your yeast is activated, whisk again before dumping into the flour.  I use a long-handled wooden spoon to mix, but anything with a long handle will do.  Then grab 1¼ pints warm water and add slowly (maybe ½ pint at a time?) to the flour, mixing as you go.  Once you’ve added all the water, mix as well as you can in the bowl – it will NOT be perfect, there will be flour at the bottom that’s hard to get to!

Here’s where it gets a bit messy!  But have fun with it...dump the whole lot out onto a worktop and mix it together with your hands.  Once all the flour is integrated, knead the dough for around 8-10 minutes.  Put the dough back into your mixing bowl, cover with a damp tea towel or cling film (loosely) and put in a warm place* for 45min – 1hr (rising will take longer if you can’t find a warm place, but don’t be afraid to leave the dough for longer if it needs it!).

Once roughly doubled in size, divide into 1/3s (I use a scale to make sure my loaves are the same size).  Form pieces into loaf shapes, place on baking trays (I can usually get 2 loaves on 1 tray and the 3^rd on another) and cover loosely with the tea towel for another 15 minutes.

Heat your oven to 200C (fan 180C).  Bake the loaves for around 30 min.

I realise this recipe sound REALLY complicated, but that’s because I tried to be as detailed as possible for bread novices.  Once you read it and do it, you’ll realise how simple it really is.  You also get the added bonus of knowing EXACTLY what’s in your bread and not eating a bunch of artificial crap.  People without children may prefer to increase salt to 15g, as that’s a more typical ratio, but your tastebuds will quickly adapt to the less-salt version.

Homemade bread tastes weird at first if all you’re used to is store-bought.  Give it a chance – you will grow to prefer it.  Even though there are no preservatives, we always get at least a week out of our bread because we keep it in the fridge.  As long as it’s wrapped up well (use old bread wrappers!), it won’t dry out.

Just a note to say that I know there’s lots of no-knead recipes out there…I’ve tried them and texture is too wet and claggy for my tastes…10 minutes of kneading is worth it to have better-tasting bread, but obviously feel free to experiment with different recipes!

* my favourite warm places are on top of the radiator (in winter) or outside in the sun (summer).  If you’re really desperate, switch your oven on 50C for a few minutes, then turn it off and let your dough rise in there.