Okay, this is a LONG LONG post. BUT by the end, you will definitely want to make this, so read it :)
This is LITERALLY the easiest white bread recipe ever. There's only SIX ingredients :)
Traditional White Bread
(recipe from my mother, I have no clue where she got it from)
6-7 cups flour
3 T sugar
1 T salt (I use kosher)
2 T shortening
2 pkgs (2T) yeast
2 1/4 cups very warm water
Now the recipe I have says oven heat is 425 degrees for 25-30 minutes. That's what my mom's oven uses. I honestly heat mine to 350 degrees for about 30-35 minutes; otherwise the tops of my bread gets too done. I guess it depends on your oven. Watch the bread closely :)
Mix 3 1/2 cups flour, sugar, salt, shortening, and yeast in large bowl.
Add warm water.
Beat (or mix with a dough blender, which is what I use) on low speed, 1 minute, scraping bowl frequently.
Stir in enough remaining flour, 1 cup at a time, to make dough easy to handle. It's not going to look great, but I promise it will once the kneading is done :)
Turn dough onto lightly covered surface. I got this next tip from Pioneer Woman-She's so smart: Take your bowl you used to mix the dough; rinse it out, and fill it with HOT water. This helps the dough rise MUCH quicker since the bowl will be warm!
Knead about 10 minutes or until smooth.
Empty your water filled bowl. Pat it dry, and spray with oil (I use organic olive oil spray). Place your dough in the greased bowl, then flip it so it's greased side up. Cover with a wet, warm towel; and let dough rise 40-60 minutes, or until double. I've noticed with the warm bowl, it literally takes like 20-30 minutes to double :)
Grease two bread pans. Divide dough in half. Watch out for fingers looking to sink the dough :)
Flatten the dough with a rolling pin. This gets out all the bubbles in your dough. I love this part, because the dough is so soft, and you can hear all the bubbles disappearing :)
Roll the dough tightly, seal after each turn. Pinch edges firmly to seal.
Press each seam side down in pan. Brush loaves lightly (don't skip this part! mmmmmm) with butter. Cover again with wet, warm towel; and let rise until double.
When it gets close to being risen enough, turn your oven on. Place oven rack in low position so tops of pans will be in the center of the oven. Bake 25-30 minutes, or until loaves are DEEP golden brown and sound hollow when tapped. Remove from pans. Brush loaves with butter all over (I never butter the bottom), if desired, which it is!
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| These loaves of bread have some herb seasonings on them. |
Cool on a wire rack, but definitely have a slice while it's warm! Bonus if you have homemade jam-there's nothing better.
Makes 2 loaves.
I normally make four loaves on Sundays, and they last until the next weekend (Tim counted-he uses 34 slices of bread each week for sandwiches. This saves us a TON of money!). Sunday is our day to relax, and it's so nice having our home smell of freshly baked bread!
NOTE: You CAN freeze this bread too, and it tastes great after thawing. I'm not too sure how long you can keep bread in the freezer; but trust me, if this bread even MAKES it to your freezer, it won't take long before you need to take it out because you've already finished eating the last loaf :)
I've made quite a few other things with this recipe, including:
Cinnamon raisin bread
I just guessed on how to make it. It's a kind of common sense recipe. All you do is once you roll the dough out, you rub butter on it; then add brown sugar, raisins, and cinnamon. I don't measure, I just guesstimate. Trust me, you'll want more than what's in this picture :) Raise it and bake it just the same as the white bread.
This was the first loaf I ever made. Don't hesitate to add a lot of brown sugar, cinnamon, and raisins! This loaf was good; but since then, I've added more of each ingredient. I have cinnamon toast for breakfast almost every morning with my eggs. It's good as a snack, too!
Cinnamon bread french toast
I was really craving some french toast the other day, so I looked it up on Food Network. I used a loaf of my cinnamon bread that I had freshly made that morning and used this recipe by Robert Irvine. This was definitely sweet, but SO GOOD!!! And I had leftovers for a few days, and they tasted just as good as the first day (well, maybe a little bit more dry lol).
Garlic bread
This garlic bread is the BOMB!
For garlic bread, once you've risen the dough once, split it in half, and rolled it out, grease a cookie sheet (I use organic olive oil spray), twist the dough like the picture below, and place it onto the pan (run-on sentence, I KNOW). I then melt a couple tablespoons of butter with garlic salt (I never measure, just guess) and "paint" it on.
I found a garlic romano seasoning from Bargain Barn in my local town lol. It's SO good, but I have no clue where you'd buy it. Sprinkle any type of garlicky, breadsticky seasoning :) Let the dough raise until double, or just until the size you want.
Bake the bread for approximately 12-15 minutes. Watch close-you don't want it to burn!
Too bad you don't get to see it when it's done yet lol. The first time I made the bread, I forgot to take a final picture. The second time, I forgot to put yeast in the dough, and it didn't raise. Needless to say, there is no final picture yet :)
Garlic knots
I got this idea from a pizza parlor in Lansing we went to recently. It's SO easy! All you do is use the white bread recipe until you've flattened the dough with the rolling pin. You then cut wedges of dough, stretch them so they thin out and get longer, and tie them (Yes, I forgot to photograph this too. I will the next time I make them).
Brush with butter and garlic (use however much you want). I baked mine at 400 degrees for like 12 minutes. Just watch them. When you take them out, brush with butter and garlic again. MMMMMMMMMMMM
delicious salad too. mmmmmmmmmm.
YUM!!!! All I can say is I LOVE to bake bread. It's so exciting spicing up dinner by making something new. I love it.
