geardrops [blog]

Until recently, I bought bread from a store. Now I bake it. And trust me, it’s super-easy. But I managed to screw up the recipe a few times before I finally got it right. If the recipe had only told me specific tricks, I would have ended up with good bread the first time around.

So I’m compiling those tricks into the Absolute Noob Guide To Baking Bread. For you. (Though perhaps I should also subtitle it “Engineer Edition” because I do explain the science of bread.)

Note this is obviously a plain white loaf. I haven’t made anything fancy yet. The plan is to make a nice heavy rye at some point (because I’m Polish, and we loves our rye). It’s also not gluten-free, and I bake at a low altitude.

Materials

• Measuring cups
• Measuring spoons
• Mixing bowl
• Mixing spoon
• Bread pan
• Cooking spray
• Rolling pin (I’ve used a wine bottle in a pinch)
• Timer
• Oven

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup whole milk (regular, not lactose-free)
• 1 1/2 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 tbsp butter, melted
• 1 package active dry yeast
• 3 cups flour (get bread flour, which has a high gluten content, and gives the bread structural integrity)

Instructions

1. Pour hot water into your mixing bowl, to warm it up.

   Science: You see, yeast is an organism, and it does so love specifically-temperatured environments. Body temperature, to be precise. Too cold and it won’t be active, too hot and you will kill it. I’ve found pouring the hot water from the tap into my metal bowl is sufficient.

2. In your now-warmed bowl, mix the yeast with some warm water. Stir until there are no lumps, then wait a minute or two. You should see bubbles.

   Science: Here you need to be a little more cautious with the water. I’ve found going above 120F/50C will make your yeast sad-pants. Below 95F/35C and you won’t get active yeast. Use a thermometer to check. I recommend a candy thermometer, as it’s also useful for making jam, and if you’re going to make your own bread, don’t you want to slather it with your own jam?

3. Pour the following ingredients into the bowl: butter, milk, sugar, salt. Mix.
4. Pour flour into your bowl, 1/2c at a time, stirring at every interval.

   Notes: If, after every 1/2c interval, your dough is too dry, add some water. Sparingly (a little goes a long way). If the dough is too sticky, more flour. This isn’t something I can explain well. It should “feel” right. The lack of accuracy makes this segment a note and not science. Also it lacks science.

5. Set the timer for ten minutes, and knead your dough on a floured surface until those ten minutes are up.

   Science: So what’s going on here is, you’re spreading out the yeast, and various sugars evenly throughout the dough. This will ensure even rising of the dough.

6. Set the timer for one hour. Place your dough in a bowl, lining the bowl with either cooking spray or cornstarch if that’s your fancy, so the dough doesn’t stick to it (but it’s not a crime if it does). Perhaps cover your bowl with a dish towel to keep gross bits from landing on it. At the end it should have risen somewhat. (If it didn’t, your yeast is dead, so don’t bother continuing.)

   Science: Ensure that, as before, you do not place this anywhere that is too warm or too cold. I have found, however, that room temperature (I keep my place at an even 70F/20C, and this has proven to be just fine and dandy).

7. Heat your oven to 400F/200C.

   Note: Give yourself enough time so this is done by the time you are ready to place the dough in the oven. You really don’t want to have your ready-to-go dough sitting for ages while your oven heats.

8. Set the timer for ten minutes and knead the dough once more.

   Science: During the rising periods, yeast is eating all that sugar (hence my being specific about not using lactose-free milk; lactose is milk sugar, and necessary for this recipe) and converting it into air (not unlike the human body with beans). This is why we did all that kneading, to spread out these yeast cells (which reproduced during the first rising period, hence the need for two separate rounds of kneading).

9. Roll the dough flat, approximately the width of your bread pan (not larger than, though). Roll your dough up like you’d roll up a newspaper, but really super-tight. Spray the inside of your baking pan with cooking spray and place your dough in, seam-side down.
10. Set the timer for one hour. Let your dough rise again. Within the hour it should double in size.

    Note: It is better to let your dough continue to rise past the one-hour mark than to put it in the oven when it hasn’t risen. However, if you find yourself waiting another hour, your yeast is dead.

11. Bake for 30m.
12. Pop out of the pan and let cool completely before cutting.

    Note: Is your bread really crumbly? This is because you used low-gluten or gluten-free flour. . For gluten-free bread, I suggest you do a Google search, as this recipe will certainly not work with gluten-free flour.

That’s really all there is to it. The first bit takes about a half hour, so this is a great activity to nest in with doing laundry or cleaning your home or catching up on your favorite anime. I like to have this going while writing, personally.

Next bread-making endeavor will be rye. Once I get that recipe to a point where I’m making bread I like, I’ll post it. But I’ve used the above recipe, with extra tips, twice, successfully. If you ever find any problems in bread-baking, I recommend the bread troubleshooting table. It’s money.

I pinched this recipe from Martha Stewart, which is really from Sprinkles, but then I changed it, half from accidents, half from really liking strawberries.

• 2/3 cup whole fresh or frozen strawberries, thawed (I doubled this)
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, sifted
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup whole milk, room temperature
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 large egg, room temperature (I accidentally used 2 and it still came out great)
• 2 large egg whites, room temperature
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature

These are my steps, I’ve modified the recipe a bit. I already noted above the doubling of strawberries. Can’t have too many! (And the second egg was an accident, but it didn’t mess up the end results.)

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Puree half your strawberries, then slice the other half.
3. In one bowl, mix your dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, sugar, salt.
4. In another bowl, mix your wet ingredients: eggs, milk, vanilla.
5. Whip that butter. Nice and light and fluffy.
6. Drop a bit of the wet and a bit of the dry into the butter. Mix. Repeat until all ingredients are blended. Then add the strawberries and mix well.
7. And you know what? Add some red food coloring to make them pink. Seriously, these cakes come out weird in color without it. If I had red food coloring I would have done this (alas, I was out, red velvet is a demanding beast).
8. Bake for 20-25 minutes.
9. Let cool, frost, eat.

Oh, and for the cream cheese frosting, I just drop a block of it in a bowl and start sprinkling sugar in and whipping it with a spatula until it looks/tastes/feels like I like. No vanilla, no need for it if you ask me.

But really, the best modification I think was slicing up those strawberries. The batter tasted like straight sugar, no strawberry at all, and once they settled and cooled they got much better (in fact, they tasted better a few hours after baking them as opposed to freshly baked). Every bite you hit with a strawberry in it was the best.