Beginner - looking for basic & simple bread recipes
Hi everyone. I'm new to this website and forum. I read the book Bread Alone by Judith Hendricks and was instantly inspired to bake - even though I know absolutely nothing about baking bread :-). I love bread and I think there is nothing better than the smell of home-made bread. I have very fond memories of my gran (who was Portuguese) baking her sweet potato loaves and we would all wait impatiently until the bread was out of the oven and almost tear the loaf apart and smear big blobs of butter all over it. And I was so disppointed that the recipe was never passed down to my mother :-(. I would love to have a home where my family experience the joy of home-made bread and to give them this experience and pass down recipe's to my children.
I need to start from the very beginning. Could anyone please recommend a very simple, basic bread recipe that I could try at home? I would appreciate it! And I love all the recipe's I've come across on this website - they all look so yummy!
I can't wait to start baking!
Welcome to the Fresh Loaf! Noe click on"Lessons" at th top of the page, and there you are. We welcome any queations you might have.
Ford
that is really sweet, i want the same thing as you and i think ive started to achieve it, as recently while my kids were playing at the beach with their friends in the sand, my three year old, was making 'dough', lol, normal kids make sand castles! so i think the obsession is being passed on already, lol :)
i love portuguese baking, i think i have a portuguese bread recipe in a cookbook i have but haven't looked in for ages, its called 'all around the world cookbook'. i will have a look soon :)
Try the recipes "Your First Loaf", "My Daily Bread", and "Rustic Loaf". They can all be found on the home page and teach valuable lessons for future bakers who want to dip their fingers in the dough for the first time. The comments after the recipes are just as valuable because many were submitted by first time bakers.
After you gain some confidence and want to try something new, the King Arthur Flour, known as KAF here, website has a lot more recipes than most people would try in a year. If you hang out here on TFL long enough, you may get interested in sourdough breads. Use the search button at the top left of the page and you'll find more than enough information to keep you busy learning. Jump in anytime, the water is fine and the inhabitants friendly.
could help...
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/10631/portuguese-bread-recipe-search
I agree with the above posts, too...lots of good advice and friendly, helpful folks (MORE THAN 99% of the time, anyway!) ;-)
Welcome,
copyu
About as simple as it can get:
http://www.flournwater.com/food_018.htm
Thank you everyone for being so helpful and kind and for all your suggestions. I actually saw the basic bread recipe under "lessons" after I posted this comment. I will start baking as soon as I'm back from my weekend away - here in South Africa we have a public holiday on Monday so we get to enjoy a long weekend! Perhaps an idea to take the recipe with me and try it when we're away.
Happy weekend to you all! And thank you again!
I started baking in college. Now I'm a three-time grandfather. It took me a long time to realize that the techniques for Northern European breads (the ones with a dense inside and usually a thin crust) are hugely different from the techniques for Southern European ones (the ones with a thicker crust and lots of holes inside). The denser breads use less water (per unit of flour) than the more holey ones (which use much more liquid.) As you might expect, while there's much to learn, I would recommend that you decide which kind of bread you want to try first, Northern or Southern European. Then pick a recipe and proceed to fail away, learning from your mistakes as you go. Unless you always are making hockey pucks (and sometimes you will, if you're like me) you'll find that, despite how bad you think the bread is, everyone else will be awed.
Don't forget that there are literally hundreds of videos available on Youtube which illustrate virtually anything you want to learn about techniques.
Oh, look for a local mentor who can help you with the "dance of dough".
Wish I could be there for you.
Thank you for your advice. I personally prefer more denser breads - so Northern European is what I will be looking into. Theres just so much information on the web - its a little daunting but very exciting.
Thank you again for your advice -and I'll definitley look into the videos on Youtube.
Best wishes!
Hello Bread Lover Sam (from bread lover Paul!)
Here's my advice and several recipes for a beginner. I spend my life telling and showing people just how easy it is to make bread - probably the easiest thing you can do in the kitchen, IMO!
Have a look at this 'Beginner's' post - I've tried to cover everything.
http://nobreadisanisland.blogspot.com/2010/05/beginners-start-here.html
Best wishes, Paul
Thank you so much - will have a look at the link - much appreciated!
My first attempt. I'm having some difficulty uploading pics but here's the URL's - not sure if you can view them.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/imce?app=tinymce%7Curl%40src
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/imce?app=tinymce%7Curl%40src
I can't see your photo's, I'm afraid.
However, sounds like your bread came out OK - otherwise you wouldn't be taking pics! :-D
So, well done!
Paul