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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.
Excellent recipe! It’s better than any online, store bought, or box mixes that I’ve tried. I have made at least one loaf a week for the past three months, and my family thoroughly enjoys it. Definitely a winner!
I am so glad to hear that! Your comment made my day! 🙂
Couldn’t eat one bite without thanking you. Our son stayed up this hour to taste the first home made bread. Best we ever had.
Many Thanks and wishing you all the happiness
I am so pleased to read comments like yours! So glad this recipe was useful!
Brilliant recipe. The sifting of the flour seems to work fabulously. Best loaves I have produced in my bread maker. I had put my machine away and was making by hand but after seeing this recipe thought i'd try one last time. Bread maker here to stay now thank you.
You are very welcome! I am so glad this recipe was useful, and that you are now using the bread machine again!
Awesome recipe. It definitely made it light and fluffy compared to my last dense loaf.
So happy to hear that!
I have been making bread for, wow, like 15 years now. Some extra tips;
Like someone else said, eyeball the dough for a few minutes. I am horrible about using proper scoops of flour, so I always need to add more water. If the dough is crumbly and knocking around, add more water. If it makes a squelching noise and sticks to the pan, add more flour.
I put the butter in first, then hot water to help soften and melt it.
When I don't have bread flour, I like to just use the dough cycle, let the dough rise in little bread pans for 30min-1hr, then bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes. Make it extra fluffy and gives you the opportunity to make sure the dough is the right consistency and to add stuff to it to make cinnamon swirl bread or garlic bread.
Thanks so much for this recipe, it's a life-saver! I'd had my machine for years but had never successfully made a good, non-dense and doughy loaf. This works very well for my needs. I typically use half bread flour and half whole wheat (occasionally multigrain flour instead of the whole wheat if I can find a good brand) and add 4tsp vital wheat gluten to help the texture (which is honestly pretty good even without it.)
One thing I'd recommend- keep an eye on the machine in its first mix cycle. I've noticed that my dough tends to be a bit dry (probably just due to my apartment's ambient temp and air quality); if there's chunks of flour and dough that're swirling around the bottom of the pan and not adhering to the larger dough lump, try putting in a tiny bit of water til it all sticks together. If you go too far, a small sprinkle of flour will bring things right back. I tend to get a slightly-bigger loaf if I do that rather than just dump things in the machine and let it go on its own. 🙂
Thank you for such a kind and thoughtful comment! So happy you found my recipe useful!
Hi Julia...I just bought a Zojirushi Home Bakery Virtuoso am am anxious to make a loaf with this recipe using your tips about the flour. I made my first loaf yesterday and found it a little disappointing because I didn’t use the dark crust setting and it didn’t rise as much as I’d hoped and am guessing that was because I scooped the flour! I will try your recipe and method of sifting the flour tomorrow! My question is, can this be made in a two pound bread maker?
Also can you use butter instead of oil, and if so how much?
Pam
Hi Julia...I just bought a Zojirushi Home Bakery Virtuoso am am anxious to make a loaf with this recipe using your tips about the flour. I made my first loaf yesterday and found it a little disappointing because I didn’t use the dark crust setting and it didn’t rise as much as I’d hoped and am guess that was because I scooped the flour! I will try your recipe and method of sifting the flour tomorrow! My question is, can this be made in a two pound bread maker?
Also can you use butter instead of oil, and if so how much?
Pam
The recipe and instructions are in Haiti now, along with two bread makers for our orphanage children to make bread. Thank yo u so much
You are very welcome! I am so happy to hear that my recipe is useful!
Can this recipe be done with whole wheat flour?
I am not sure if this recipe would work well with whole wheat flour. The loaf might be too dense.
I carefully converted cups to grams using this chart from jsward.com
Weights of common ingredients in grams
Ingredient 1 cup 3/4 cup
Flour, all purpose (wheat) 120 g 90 g
Flour, well sifted all purpose (wheat) 110 g 80 g
Sugar, granulated cane 200 g 150 g
It worked wonders. The bread turned out light and fluffy by strong enough to be sliced without mushing it.
This is going to be my go-to recipe to use with my bread machine! Thank you
You are very welcome! So glad you enjoyed this recipe! Thank you for stopping by and sharing how you made this bread.
I made this recipe last week after getting my SKG bread maker(newbe). It was amazing...making another today. My family devared it. Needless to say I wont have to buy store bought bread anymore. Thanks for sharing this with us.
So glad you enjoyed this recipe!
Hi Julia,
I made this today using all purpose flour, did not have bread flour on hand.
I have had my bread machine for over six years. This is the first recipe that turned out good. Will make again.
Thank you for the flour advice, i weighed mine and will be making again!
I am so glad you found my recipe useful! Thank you for stopping by and leaving such a nice and thoughtful comment.
Hiya Julia. I'm new to bread making and acquired a bread machine. Looking at the ingredients it says 3 a quarter cups of flour I work out that's 731.25g is that right?
Hi Elizabeth, it is 3 and 1/4 cups of flour. Thats what i used anyway lol and works perfectly!
Oops sorry forgot to finish typing! its about 455grams i believe. 140grams per 1 us cup and 1/4 cup is 35 grams.... hopefully that helps? 🙂
Hi Natalie.
Thx for a reply and putting me right on the measurements. I'll give it a try and hopefully I'll get good results
Congratulations on acquiring a bread machine! 1 cup of bread flour is 120 grams, so 3 1/4 cups of bread flour is 390 grams.
Hi Julia!
I love how you gave the easiest steps and the tip on the flour. Your recipe was the best 1 so far. Thank you!
I am so happy to hear that! Thank you for such an amazing comment! It makes me feel really good!