5 Ingredient White Bread Recipe (2024)

If you're looking for a soft and chewy white bread that's perfect for sandwiches, toast, and snacking- this 5 Ingredient White Bread Recipe is it!

I love EVERYTHING about making homemade white bread! The smell of the yeast dough proofing and baking, all the way up to seeing that gorgeous golden top crust and slicing through to reveal the soft fluffy crumb inside.

This dairy free sandwich bread recipe is easy, simple, and PERFECT for beginner bread makers. Speaking of bread makers, I've included steps below and on the recipe card explaining how to make milk free white bread in the bread machine if you don't wish to make it by hand.

For more bread recipes, make sure to check out my Vegan Hamburger Buns and 2 Hour No Knead White Bread.

🥘Ingredients

Ingredient Notes:

Flour- You can use all-purpose flour or bread flour, depending on what you have on hand. Both are great, but bread flour has more protein and will give you a slightly chewier texture and stronger bread flavor.

Yeast- You can use any dry active or instant yeast. We will not be proofing the yeast beforehand, so make sure the expiration date on your yeast packet is still good.

Sugar- To feed the yeast, we need to add in a little granulated sugar. You could use honey or agave if desired.

Water- This is technically "not an ingredient" since it's not something you'd buy at a store. The water is used to bring the dough together and give it the moisture needed for baking. Room temperature water (or slightly warmed) is best. The optimal temperature is 110F.

For specific ingredients and measurements, please see the recipe card below.

🔪 Instructions for Homemade White Bread Recipe

Step 1: Add flour, yeast, and salt to a large mixing bowl.

Step 2: Whisk together to combine.

Step 3: Make a well in the center and add in the sugar, oil, and water.

Step 4: Stir the dough to combine. The dough will appear shaggy.

Step 5: Turn the dough onto a floured surface. Feed it more flour as needed as you knead for 10 minutes. It shouldn't be sticking to your fingers.

Step 6: Knead for 10 minutes until smooth and elastic. If pressed, it should "spring back" to fill in the gap.

Step 7: Place your dough into a clean greased mixing bowl. Top with plastic wrap.

See Also

Basic No-Knead Bread | Guest Recipes | Nigella's RecipesFoolproof Homemade Sourdough Bread RecipeOur Customizable Recipe Will Help You Make Perfect Stuffing Just the Way You Like ItTartine Sourdough Country Loaf Bread Recipe

Step 8: Let rise 1 hr or until doubled in size.

Step 9: Punch down the dough.

Step 10: Roll the dough back out onto a floured surface and shape it into a log and place it into your greased bread pan.

Step 11: Cover the top of the dough with plastic wrap again and wait about an hour until doubled in size.

Step 12: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and bake the bread for 30-35 minutes.

Step 13: Cool the bread for at least one hour before slicing.

👩🏻‍🍳 Common Issues and Solutions

🍞Why is my bread tearing?

If your dough tears when being baked, it's because the elasticity in the gluten didn't get to spring to life as it should have. This could be from the dough drying out during the proofing.

It's basically like the bread dough created a crust before it baked, so the dough didn't have anywhere to expand as it was being baked and created its own exit paths. This is why some people will cut a line down their loaf before baking, to encourage the tearing to happen only where they want it to.

If your bread tears or falls apart as it's being sliced, This is most likely because the bread was under-kneaded and the gluten wasn't properly developed. Make sure it's properly kneaded before proofing.

Another cause is under proofing. While most recipes will say to rise for 1 hour or until doubled. Many people choose the 1 hour wait time and will bake the bread before it has actually doubled.

Please wait until the bread has risen to double its original size, and just use the "listed time" as a guestimate, as it can be faster or longer depending on many different factors.

🍞How do I know if my bread is done?

The internal temperature of the bread should be around 190-205F. Stick close to the specific bread recipe you're using, as the baker often gives a temperature to check for. Underbaking your bread by even 10 degrees can cause different results than expected.

🍞Why is my bread dense in the center?

Did you slice it while the loaf was still warm? Did it reach the proper temperature, or was it underbaked? Are you sure you kneaded it well enough? All of these things can cause your loaf to be dense in the middle.

🥖 How Long to Proof Dough

The time needed to proof dough truly varies from person to person. It depends upon the weather, climate, wind drafts, temperature of ingredients, age of the yeast, and more.

On average, it can take anywhere between 1 hour to 3 hours for the dough to proof properly, but some people can see it happen in as little as 30 minutes.

The goal is not waiting to a specific time but instead looking for a specific response from the dough. We want the dough to be doubled in size, and whether that takes one hour or more, we shouldn't jump straight into the next step before completing this one.

You should expect that it will take about 1 hour for your dough to double in size and proof, but here are some tips for getting it there.

• Cover the bowl of dough with greased plastic wrap. This helps to prevent the dough from drying out and helps to trap the heat. The cooking spray on the plastic wrap helps to prevent it from sticking to the dough.
• Store it in a warm location. I like to preheat my oven to 200 degrees F for 2 minutes and then turn it off. Then I place the bowl in the oven and let it rise until doubled.

Other locations to place your dough include:

• Inside your closed microwave
• Inside a closed oven with just the oven light turned on
• On a hot and sunny day, your kitchen's countertop can work well too

🍞 How to Knead Bread Dough

Kneading your dough with an electric mixer using dough hooks is simple and easy, but my favorite method is to do it by hand because you're far less likely to overwork the dough when doing it this way.

Knead the dough by hand by placing it onto a floured surface and using two hands to roll it out into an oval, pull back half, so it's sandwiched together, and repeat.

Smoosh the dough as you roll it back out into an oval, and bring it back. Every few times, rotate the dough about 90 degrees so that you can get all of the dough worked into the process.

When the dough is smooth and elastic, it's finished. This takes about 10 minutes by hand, faster if you're quick, but there are a few good ways to tell when you are finished.

1. The dough should not tear easily. This means that if you stretch a chunk of the dough between your fingers, it doesn't tear apart like paper and creates jagged edges.
2. The dough should be elastic. You should be able to poke the ball of kneaded dough with your finger and watch the dough quickly try to bounce back and fill in the hole you made.

💭 Recipe FAQs

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