Our family loves bread. We literally live on bread. For years we have been buying bread and I had never thought I would bake bread in my own home! Last year, in my yearly goals, I put in bread baking but never got to making that goal come to pass! Well, thanks to COVID-19, all the bread suppliers came to a grinding halt and I was left with no option but to bake my own bread.
Last year, when I wanted to bake, I searched the net for recipes and saved a few so that I wanted to try. With the onset of COVID-19 and no bread availability, I quickly searched through my saved recipes and found a recipe that looked simple enough. You can check it out at Soulful Bakes.
I have tried this recipe multiple times with great result.
I have modified this initial recipe to suit our taste. Just the way we like it. Soft and melt in the mouth!
Basic bread
Equipment
- Oven
- Mixing bowls
- Measuring spoons
- Measuring cups
- Bread pan
Ingredients
- 2½ cups maida/ All Purpose Flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 4 tbsp olive oil Extra Virgin
- 1⅛ tbsp yeast Instant yeast
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 1 cup water warm to touch; hot water kills the yeast so be careful.
- 1 tsp butter for applying over warm bread.
Instructions
- Add sugar and yeast to the warm water and wait for about 10 min; it will froth. This shows that the yeast is alive and active
- In a mixing bowl, add the maida and the salt. Mix it with a whisk.
- Add the frothed up mixture of yeast, sugar and water to the mixing bowl.
- Add 3 tbsp of olive oil to the mixture.
- Knead it all to a smooth dough.
- Add 1 tbsp of olive oil and knead one last time. Make a ball and cover with a kitchen towel. Leave it in a warm place to rise.
- Allow it to rest for 1 hour or until the mixture doubles. This is the first rise.
- After an hour, punch down the air from the dough and roll it into a rectangle on a lightly floured surface and then roll it like you would roll for a swiss roll/log.
- Prepare the bread pan by lining with oilve oil and lightly dusting it with flour.
- Transfer this log into a bread pan.
- Allow it to rise for half an hour. This is the second rise.
- Pre-heat the oven to 180°C.
- Put the bread pan in the oven and bake it for 25 min or till the top is lightly browned. You will also smell the aroma of freshly baked bread.
- Remove the bread pan from oven, brush the top with butter.
- Put the bread pan back in the over for about 5- 10 min for the bread to brown.
- Remove from oven and transfer the bread to a cooling rack. Brush with more butter.
- Wait for 10 min, slice and serve warm. We can never wait more in our home.