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There are many bread machine recipes out there, but if you're looking for just basic and simple homemade white bread - this is the perfect recipe for you!
This is my reliable, "boring", proven recipe for a basic white bread. And, I also provide tips on how to make a homemade white bread less dense in a bread maker. In this recipe, all you do is spend 5 minutes to add ingredients to the bread pan and the bread machine does all the work, on an automatic cycle that is already programmed. That's the whole purpose of the bread maker, right? The end result is a tasty loaf of white bread just of the right density.
I do believe that the day will come when I will use a bread machine for something more sophisticated, but for once this week I am sharing the recipe that doesn't require too much thinking or meddling. Sometimes it's just nice to make certain foods almost on auto-pilot, especially for basic stuff, like white bread.
In the last 3 months I hardly bought any store-made bread, baking about a loaf every week at home, using bread machine recipes. And, I've noticed a couple of trends/issues when making bread: sometimes the bread comes out way too dense, or the loaf does not rise enough and, as a result, comes out even denser. So, here I will describe the homemade bread recipe that works for me to produce a less dense bread in a bread maker, using a basic cycle.
While making bread in a bread machine, make sure to consider these points:
- When you measure flour using cups, make sure not to pack flour too dense in a measuring cup, otherwise you will end up with much more flour than you need, and, therefore, the bread will come out denser. Measuring flour correctly will solve a lot of "dense" issues. The trick that works for me is that I use ⅓ measuring cup to carefully scoop all flour I need into the bread machine (usually about 3 cups), without over-packing it. Another way would be to weigh flour, which I don't do, but it's a solution.
- Use bread flour, not regular all-purpose flour for all bread machine recipes. Bread flour contains a higher percentage of gluten than regular all-purpose flour. Using bread flour will produce taller, less dense loaves. If you use all-purpose flour (which has smaller percentage of gluten than bread flour), your loaves will be flatter and denser.
- When adding yeast, make sure you add it last, and add it on top of dry ingredients (flour). Make sure the yeast does not reach wet ingredients. Basically, make a small indentation on top of flour and add the yeast to the indentation, just like this:
And here is the simple white bread recipe. I started with the recipe that came in a little booklet together with my Williams-Sonoma bread machine, and I tweaked the ingredient measurements based on my preferences. It takes 10 minutes to prepare all ingredients together, and then it takes 3 hours and 15 minutes to bake the bread in a bread machine.
Bread Machine Recipe: How to make homemade white bread less dense
Ingredients
- 1 cup and 3 tablespoons water
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 1 ½ teaspoons salt
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 3 ¼ cups white bread flour
- 2 teaspoons active dry yeast
Instructions
Important note about properly measuring flour using measuring cups:
- The proper way to measure flour using measuring cups is to aerate it first. This is done either by sifting flour, or aerating it by fluffing it up and whisking it well, then spooning it into the measuring cup, then carefully removing any excess flour with a knife. If you just stick that measuring cup in the bag of flour and scoop some out, you will get a lot more flour than what the recipe calls for. Do aerate the flour, or you will end up with dry dough!
How to make bread in a bread machine:
- Add water and oil into the bread pan. Add salt, sugar. Add flour.
- Make a small indentation on top of flour and make sure it does not reach wet ingredients. Add the yeast to the indentation.
- Keep yeast away from the salt.
- Insert the bread pan into the bread machine, press it down to snap. Close the lid.
- Use Basic bread, 1.5 lb loaf, medium crust cycle (3 hrs 15 minutes)
- When bread is done, remove the bread pan using oven mitts. Turn over the bread pan and shake it to release the loaf. Let the loaf cool on a wire rack for about 30 minutes.
Notes
- The recipe is adapted from Williams-Sonoma bread machine booklet.
- I have recently tweaked this recipe and made a delicious rustic Bread Machine Garlic & Herb Bread (with fresh rosemary and thyme) - worth checking out!
My Other Bread Recipes
Nutrition
Nutrition Disclaimer:
The nutritional information on this website is only an estimate and is provided for convenience and as a courtesy only. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed. It should not be used as a substitute for a professional nutritionist's advice.
This is the second loaf of bread I’ve made this week and the first with this recipe. It turned out soooo much better than the first and other recipe I used. All I have is all purpose flour so I used it and I sifted it. The bread is perfect! Light and airy, big dense. It’s substantial, too. Definitely will keep this as my go to easy recipe. Yum!!!
I hadn't used my bread maker for years - if I wanted fresh bread, I would just make it by hand. However, I thought I would dig it out and teach my daughter (11 years old) how to make a loaf of bread since it is uncertain these days if the store will have any bread, and she has lots of time with no school and no social events. This bread turned out perfect and she had fun making it. Nice texture and flavour. I found it was still good the next day untoasted, and was fine for toast on the third day. Today we substituted half the white flour with multigrain, and it was amazing. We made the best grilled cheese sandwiches ever with it. She has promised to keep making bread for the family even after the restrictions are released.
I can’t get the bread out of the pan it’s stuck was I supposed to grease it?
Whenever I make bread in my machine, it always seems to have too little water. When it's mixing, it looks thin and dry with a lot of flour that doesn't seem to mix in. So I always end up adding a little water until everything has mixed in. The same happened in this recipe. Any tips?
I have just got a new machine and experimenting; what is "one cup and 3 tbs" in mils pls?
Also my bread comes out rather chewy and I don't really like that... any tips pls?
Absolutely perfect! Thank you!
Perfect the first time. Hubby like about 1/2 tsp more of salt. Not me, it was great!
L
Why even help such a pessimistic person like you. You deserve a hard crust.
Poor flour.
This turned out great! I used all purpose flour (all I had on hand) and olive oil instead of vegetable oil and it tasted wonderful! Will definitely keep this as a regular bread recipe.
Question I just made your recipe however when I put into the bread machine it went immediately to 2 hours sndx45 Mina instead of the 3 hour time frame!!
This was so awesome! Thanks for sharing!! My girls loved it, and I substituted a cup of whole wheat.
5 star!
I have an Oster bread maker and although delicious, the recipes that come with the machine always came out super dense. Tried tweaking the recipes with your recommendations ultimately it was less flour and more oil (I use EVOO) and sugar. I also aerated the flour, I usually just spoon it into my scoop, but I could definitely tell that there was a difference in my measurements. My husband said it was the best I've ever made!! Thanks for having this available.
You didn’t mention the temperature of the water. Should it be warm for the yeast?
Hi, just wanted to tell you that this recipe worked out perfectly, thank you for sharing it. I had just bought a bread machine and tried two other recipes off the internet that turned out to be duds. Third time was the charm. Great bread!
This bread came out better than PERFECT! Thank You for sharing this recipe! I tried another one I tried before yours but it called for mostly All-Purpose Flour and that's all you can taste but then I found yours and it is Fantastic! Thank You!