Homemade Yeast Bread

A couple weeks back, I was missing my best friend Jackie like crazy and her mouthwatering delicious White Chicken Chili, which should made often when we had get-togethers. Even though she shared the recipe with me about a year back I never made it. A part of me felt like I could never get it to taste as special as when she cooked it for me. It sounds silly, I know, but I guess I am just sensitive when it comes to my best friend's things!

I finally worked up the courage to just go ahead and make it and hope that it will taste just as delicious as when she makes it.

After telling my other friends about it one of them asked me if I am going to make my homemade bread with it (and if I can finally pass on the recipe to her).

What a great idea! Homemade bread it was!  I decided if I am going to share this recipe with my friend, I might as well share it with everyone.

It’s super simple and you can use this recipe in many ways. It’s actually a big hit when my husband decides to cook his special chili and you can just eat it with anything.

Sometimes I just bake some and we use it for sandwiches, with breakfast or as a dinner side.

Homemade Yeast Bread
(makes about 2 round loafs)

Here is what you will need:

-          Big bowl, preferably with lid.

-          Measuring cups and spoons

-          Cookie sheets, lined with parchment paper.

-          3 cups of lukewarm water (or read about the other options for this below!)

-          ½ tbsp. of active dry yeast

-          1 tbsp. sugar

-          1 ½ tbsp. salt

-          6 - 7 cups of flour

Just start by putting the warm water into the big bowl. You can also substitute this easily with beer if you’re going for a beer bread with a smoky note.

Then add in the sugar, stir slightly until it starts to dissolve (it does not need to be dissolved all the way!). Sprinkle the yeast into the water. I prefer to buy the yeast in the jar because I never had good luck with the small packages for some reason.

One of the reasons why this bread recipe asks for sugar is so the yeast rises better. Yeast lives off of sugar. You can always leave it out if you don’t want sugar in it. It’s just my way of making this recipe pretty much ‘fool proof’.

Let the yeast mixture sit about 10 minutes.

The yeast will start to build big foamy bubbles on the top – that’s how you know it is working!

Sprinkle the salt over it and then start adding the flour.

For the flour, you can use any flour, but if you decide on a whole wheat you won’t need as much as if you were using regular white flour.  Whole wheat is more dense.

I usually start by adding 5 cups of flour, and then knead it all together; adding another cup in between. If the dough is very sticky I’ll add more flour, usually ¼ cup at the time.

The dough should be a little sticky but not slimy - the more you knead, the better the gluten breaks down, giving yeast bread dough a wonderful elastic quality.

At this point you can also add in seeds, nuts or whatever you feel like. I added walnuts and chia seeds before and it was delicious. Sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, flax, etc. are also great ideas!

Once you'v kneaded the dough really well, just put the lid on and place it in a warm spot. I like putting it either outside in the sun or inside if it’s warmer there.

Let it rise for about 45-60 minutes.

When it’s done rising, give it another good knead and add a little more flour if it’s too sticky.

Now you can let it rise again or just simply form your two loafs or one giant loaf. (A second rise will make for a more fluffy loaf.)

In this case I made two loafs and flattened them out so the slices are perfect for dipping it in the chili and scooping some up!

This recipe also works amazing well if you want to make bread bowls for soup ;)

Cut into the loaf top if you want that kind of crust, then cover with a damp kitchen towel and place it on your stove while you preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

I like to leave the loafs on the stove while preheating so they get another warm rise while the oven is heating up. This is optional though.

If you want a thinner crust with more crisp (a little bit like a French bread), put a cookie sheet or casserole pan full of water on the bottom while preheating and leave it in throughout the baking. Otherwise the crust will be thicker with a crunch instead of a crisp. I like both versions. Without the water, it reminds me a lot of ciabatta bread. I love ciabatta bread!

Place the loaves in the oven and bake for 35-45minutes – until it has a nice golden crust!

Once it is done baking just take it out and let it cool.

The bread itself has a nice crust and the inside is not as fine as French bread, but rather than artisan bread with bigger ‘bubbles’ and a delicious gooeyness to it.

I hope you guys enjoy this recipe!