I bake bread all the time. Italian bread, couple different kinds, regular loaf white bread, wheat bread, rye bread, kaiser rolls, dinner rolls, lotsa bread.
Like squeeb said, the water temperature is crucial. But you can go a little higher, up to 120-125 without killing the yeast.
Look at your hot water heater and see what the highest setting is. If you have it set on a low setting, 120 degrees may be it's max, so you can just run tap water until it's as hot as it gets.
I have a stand mixer with the dough hook. If you want to bake bread on any consistent level, this will make your life much much easier. Get a good one, Kitchen Aide. Don't scrimp on a stand mixer, you'll use it for much more than bread.
I wait a few minutes to add the sugar/sweetener letting the yeast soften and grow before feeding it. Any recipe that calls for melted shortening, use olive oil. Unfortunately many new recipes have you adding the yeast to the flour then adding the liquid. You have to take the recipe apart, always add the yeast to the hot liquid, then sugar/sweetener, then oil, salt and anything else, flour is always last.
Always use unbleached flour because there is no reason to use a chemically bleached flour.
Depending on where you live, how you store your flour and other factors, you may need more or less flour than the recipe calls for. This is no big deal. (this is assuming you are using a stand mixer) Use up to but reserving 1 cup of flour the recipe calls for. If it is still batter like keep adding flour. The dough will "ball" up into a cohesive ball when it's close. Keep mixing or kneading until you can touch it without it sticking to your finger. It will be what is considered "tacky" meaning if you squeeze it, it will stick to your hand. But if you poke it, it won't stick. Add flour, a little at a time until you reach this stage. Depending on your area, up to 1 cup flour more than the recipe calls for is not unusual. I live in Florida, a very high humidity area and always have to use extra flour. Drier areas may need less flour than called for.
Now you have to remove the dough from the bowl. Take a little handful of flour into your hands to coat, remove the dough from the bowl, squeeze a little olive oil in the bottom of the bowl and toss the dough back in, turning it all around to coat with oil. It has to rise and you don't want it to dry out or form a skin of dried dough. I read alot about using a clean dish towel to cover the bowl, but I use wax paper, no sticking. Put the bowl in a corner of your kitchen that an a/c vent doesn't blow on or an outside door doesn't effect.
I've never used rapid rise yeast so I can't comment on that, but regular yeast you're good for several hours. Double in size or specific time limits like 2 hours aren't really that hard fast. As long as you don't go over say 3 hours you have some latitude.
After the initial rising, you just shape, roll, form do whatever to the dough depending on what you are making. Always lightly flour the surface you are kneading/shaping on. The second time around you DO have to carefully watch the timing of the rise. The bread will rise more once in the oven, if you allow it to over-rise before baking it will just spill over the loaf pan, etc.
Personally, I'm not a fan of metal or non-stick loaf pans or cookie sheets. The darker the pan the lower the oven temp needs to be and that doesn't work for bread products. I'm a huge fan of clear glass loaf pans and Air Bake shiny silver surface cookie sheets. Very lightly grease any pan you use.
While it's baking it will brown soon, but won't be done! Don't be afraid to let it continue to bake after it looks like it's done. Raw in the center bread is yucky. You can also use a spray bottle of water to mist the top or sides of the loaves depending on what kind of bread you are making.
Lastly, if you find a recipe you really like, don't be afraid to try and shape it into different things. Hamburger buns, smaller loaves, etc.
Last edited by Halanna; 07-10-2009 at 04:28 PM..
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