White Bread - The Basic Recipe

If you want a closer look at bread basics, we've got you covered.

(makes 2 - 1.5 lb [.7 kg] loaves):

Ingredients:

• 2 tsps (10 mL) fresh active dry yeast
• 1 tbs (15 mL) sugar (I prefer raw)
• 0.5 cups (120 mL) of water that feels just barely warm to the touch (your shooting for 105F [40C])
• 2 tsp (10 mL) salt (I prefer course kosher or sea salt)
• 1 cup (240 mL) milk, scalded and cooled to approxmately 105F (40C). If you prefer to make this pareve (non-dairy), you can substitute water, soy, almond, or rice milk, but do not scald these
• 1.5 cups (360 mL) of water that feels just barely warm to the touch (your shooting for 105F [40C])
• 7 (1.65 L)cups of unbleached, all-purpose flour. 

Directions:

1. Place the first three ingredients in a large bowl. Stir to dissolve and then let it all rest for about 10 minutes. You can use this time to get the other ingredients ready.
2. Add the salt to the bowl. Stir to dissolve and then add the rest of the liquid to the bowl.
3. Add half of the flour (3.5 Cups [830 mL]) to the bowl and stir with the wooden spoon until it is all mixed in . Add half of the remaing flour to the bowl (1.75 Cups [415 mL]) and stir with the wooden spoon until is is mixed in. Continue adding flour, by halves, until you cannot stir any more in.
4. Dust the counter top with flour and tour your dough onto the surface. Dust the top of the ball with about 1/4 cup (60 mL) of flour. Using your hands, work the flour into the dough. Keep the dusting-working process up until most of the dough is used up.
5. Knead the dough for 10 minutes (or 5 minutes if you want to use the resting method). Dust the dough lightly with flour, return it to the bowl and cover the bowl with either a lightly damp towel or a plastic shopping bag (my preference). If you are doing the resting method for your knead, then leave the covered dough for 30 minutes, turn it out onto the counter, and knead for another 3 minutes. Dust the dough with flour again, return it to the bowl, and recover with either a lightly damp towel or a plastic shopping bag. Move the bowl a warm spot and let it rise for 1 to 1.5 hours, until it's doubled in volume. This is a great time to clean up your work area.
6. Grease and flour two loaf pans.
7. Turn the onto a lightly dusted work surface. Using a serated knife, cut the dough ball in half. Gently lift each half, and tuck it into the bread pan. Don't get worried here, the dough will collapse a little or a lot with your handling, but will rise again. Cover each pan loosely with a plastic bag, and return your dough to its warm rising spot. Let it rise for 45 minutes, and then remove the pastic bags.
8. Preheat the oven to bake at 350 F (175 C). This should take at least 15 minutes so that by the time the bread goes into the oven it will have risen about 1 hour or so.
9. Place the loaf pans, evenly spaced on a wrack in the center of the oven. Bake for 15 minutes. Turn each pan one half turn and bake another 15 minutes.
10. Place pans on a cooling rack and allow them to site for 15 minutes (the bread will continue to cook), then remove the loaves from the pans, place the bread on the pans and let rest another 15 minutes (or better yet, if this is your first crack at bread making, grab a knife and slice a piece of hot bread off one of the loaves and enjoy with a little lightly salted butter!).

Once completely cooled, these loaves should be stored in plastic bags in order to keep a soft crust  and crumb. These loaves have no preservatives and so have a shelf life of about 5 days. If you want to keep them longer, wrap the completely cooled loaves in plastic wrap, place in a freezer bag and freeze for up to 3 weeks. To thaw, unwrap the loaves from the plastic and wrap instead in foil paper. Let them come to room temperature for about an  hour, and then gently reheat in a 250 F (120 C) oven for 10-15 minutes.