Easy bread

A few people have asked me about my quick, easy bread recipe, recently.  I thought that I would repost it today. It is so easy and quick to make and doesn’t need knocking back and proving twice like most recipes. I used to knead it by hand and was quite ‘snobby’ about making it the traditional way, but one day I had my hands full doing other things and so I did it in the mixer with a dough hook. I have never gone back to hand kneading as it comes out even lighter. You can get two small loaves or one big loaf from this mixture.

Recipe
700g strong bread flour (I use half white and half brown)
50g plain flour (it just makes it lighter, but you can use strong bread flour instead)
1 tsp salt
25g butter
10g of dried yeast
450ml water (3/4 pint of half cold and half boiling and combined).

Method

1.In a large bowl put the flour, salt and yeast.
2.Rub in the butter
3.Stir in the water and mix to a soft dough.
4. Knead for 10 mins either by hand or with a dough hook. Only use a little bit of flour if kneading by hand. I find that the bread is a lot lighter if you use a dough hook.
5. After kneading add any seeds, fruit, garlic, nuts or herbs etc (optional you can leave plain) and knead into the mixture.
6. Shape. (I just take out of the mixing bowl and knead a couple of time and mould it into the shape I want. Put the shaped loaf into a loaf tin or on a baking tray. Slash the top a few times with a sharp knife to stop it splitting.
Cover with oiled cling film, or a bag, or tea towel if in a warm room), and leave to rise in a warm place until it doubles its size.

In summer I do this in the conservatory or even outside. In winter place the tray on a pot on top of the wood burning stove or if I am already baking, I place it in the small oven above my large oven that is on.

7. You can put a milk glaze on top before baking in the oven (minus cling film) but I don’t. Cook for 30 to 35 mins in fan oven at 210C. The bread should sound hollow when knocked underneath when it is ready.

You can put whatever you want into this bread. I like to do rosemary annd sultana, cheese and chutney, fruit and mixed spice as a change. Sometimes I will add nettle or sunflower seeds to add nutrition to my plain bread.

I make this bread all of the time and this recipe has never failed me once. It is one of our main staples. It doesn’t  have sugar in it, either. Over the last few years I have been mixing in ancient grains as modern wheat flour has been modified. This gives us more goodness. My loaves are often a random mix of 5 or 6 flours.