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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.
Can I ask if you are using American cup size? It would be really useful to see the ml and g equivalents as really want to try this as it gets such good reviews.
Nicola, yes it's an American cup. 1 cup of white bread flour weighs 130 grams or 4.6 ounces. 3 1/4 cups of white bread flour weigh 422.50 grams or 15 ounces.
Thank you for the weight of the ingredients, I 'll be trying this recipe this week as the baseline recipe that came with my bread maker(A Zojirushi) is dense and getting it to rise correctly is often a gamble.
Can I double this recipe for a 3 lb loaf? I used this recipe in my old bread machine but had to garbage it due to the Teflon flaking off and into my bread. I just received a new bread maker for Christmas and absolutely hate the new recipe I tried. It didn’t work out at all. Was not as easy as this recipe. I’ve never made bread before other than in a machine and I was still brand new at it when the other machine broke. I know bread can be finicky to make and I don’t want to waste ingredients by trying to double the recipe! Thanks for any help you can give me!
Mercedes, yes, you can just double this recipe since this recipe is for a 1.5 lb loaf and you will use a 3 lb loaf setting. Just make sure to double all the ingredients and use the similar bread setting that I used: Basic bread, 1.5 lb loaf, medium crust cycle (3 hrs 15 minutes).
Well I tried a 3LB loaf and it seems to have come out super dense. How can I fix this? I fluffed up the flour before scooping it. This recipe used to work great for me before. Hopefully you can help me get back to this recipe!
I realized I didn’t have bread maker yeast in the last couple loafs so I picked that up and doubled up the recipe. Now the bread is rising so high that it’s coming out of the machine ♀️♀️
Great. Thank you. Solved my bread making problems. Your recipe is awesome!
Craig, I am very pleased to hear that. Thank you for your comment! 🙂
Wow! After failing with the recipe the bread machine gave me, I tried out yours and it’s AMAZING! I followed the recipe, but used 25% less yeast because I only had instant (and I read somewhere to do that). It turned out so perfect, no caved in bits or unmixed flour. Just great bread. Also, I really liked how you explained how to layer the ingredients, I had just been throwing it all in willy nilly and getting poor results. Thank you so much 🙂
Britney, I am so glad you found this recipe useful. And, you made me smile with your comment about "throwing it all in willy nilly" 🙂 Thank you so much for stopping by and sharing such positive feedback - I really appreciate it.
Hello I got a bread maker for Christmas....I was wondering what kind of yeast do you use....going to try it soon..thank you...
Edna, congratulations on getting a bread maker for Christmas - it's a wonderful tool in the kitchen! I used active dry yeast similar to this one: Active Dry Yeast.
This recipe was fantastic! I am a novice at bread making and appreciate any great tips I can get. This bread was perfectly light, and the flavor was delicious! Thanks so much!
Angelia, I am so glad you found this recipe useful! Your comment made my day! I am so happy that the simple tips in this recipe helped you make a great loaf of bread.
I find a lot of bread machines start the bake cycle to soon! I use the basic cycle to mix the dough for an hour (the panasonic has an annoying wait cycle in the dough setting) then turn the program off .
I then check every ten minutes to see how much it has risen (especially with spelt flour) once it is just above the rim i put it on bake and the bread just touches the lid of the breadmaker then drops back a fraction ,for just 4 cups its a big loaf!
Dave, thank you so much for such helpful tips! Love your idea of using the bread machine but not leaving all the decision-making up to the machine. 🙂
Very good bread. I added 1Tbsp of non-fat powdered milk. Any tips for rye bread?
Thank you, Brent! Glad you liked the recipe. Rye bread is on the to-do list!
1st try and the bread turned out excellent. Thanks for the recipe.
You are very welcome! So glad you liked this recipe! 🙂
This bread recipe has become a staple in our home. I follow the ingredient directions exactly, but choose dough cycle on my machine. When it's ready, I remove the dough and put it in a pullman loaf pan (pain de mie pan) where I let it have one last rise. Then I bake it in the oven. It is perfect! In the pullman pan, it has a very tight crumb but is still so soft. The pan and the bread recipe together produce perfect sandwich bread. Thank you for this wonderful recipe.
You are very welcome! So glad you found this recipe useful. Thank you for taking the time to share such a positive and helpful review. Love your concept of baking this bread in a Pullman loaf pan in the oven - thanks again for sharing your feedback.
Hi Julia. I made your basic bread recipe yesterday. It tasted wonderful. Now today, it doesn’t stay together very well. Is there something I can do next time to correct that?
First, I would make sure to slice the bread only after it's completely cooled off, to prevent it from falling apart.
Then, I would store the bread in an airtight plastic bag (freezer bag) in the refrigerator. I find that keeping the bread refrigerated helps keep it intact. And, of course, use a good serrated knife to slice the bread.
Here in the UK we get Allinsons Strong White Flour - which I made this into a heavy dense loaf where y I want a light fluffy (off the shelf type) of loaf in my Morphy Richard's breadmaker.
How do I achieve my ideal loaf ?
Best recipe I’ve found yet. Thanks!
I am so happy to hear that! Thank you for your comment!
Received a bread machine for my birthday and couldn’t wait to try it right away- with my limited stock of ingredients available to use your recipe was just perfect. It came out so good and so fluffy- thank you, thank you so much❤️❤️❤️
Pam, you are very welcome! So glad you found this recipe useful! 🙂
Kids loved the bread. . .they were amazed that dad could bake a loaf of bread! Lol.
Will try butter and olive oil next time
Doug, so happy you tried this recipe and enjoyed it! I am sure it will be really good with butter and olive oil!