I picked up baking as a hobby last year after moving to London, and it's one of the best decisions I've made in recent years. I can't believe how far I've come since I made my first banana bread; now I can even bake bread and pizza at home. I already shared with you how I made a seafood pizza for my birthday, and now it's time to share my homemade no-knead bread. It's easy, simple, cheap and absolutely delicious.
I baked my first bread on a random day in March of this year when I was too lazy to go out but didn't have anything left to eat except eggs. After going through my pantry, I found flour and thought I might as well make bread. I looked up easy bread recipes online and found a no-knead bread recipe, which was perfect for a beginner since you don't have to knead the dough.
I also love this recipe because I've had a bad shoulder for years, and kneading is always painful for me when I'm baking. I'm not ready to invest in a stand mixer, so this will be my go-to bread recipe for now. I haven't bought bread from supermarkets since April; it took a few mistakes before I got it right.
It requires only 3 ingredients, which can be found in most pantries: Bread flour, salt, and Yeast. Although I used 2 types of flour for the bread shown in the photo, I used both white bread flour and wholemeal flour, which explains the colour.
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| Mixing the ingredients in a bowl |
Easy Homemade Bread Recipe
Ingredients:
Salt: 1/2 tsp
Yeast: 1 tbsp
Bread Flour: 1 cup
Wholemeal Flour: 2 cups
Water: 1 and 1/2 cups
I poured 1 and 1/2 cups of water into a mixing bowl and added salt and yeast. I mixed everything and let it sit for 10 minutes to activate the yeast. The next step was to add flour. I started with wholemeal flour, then white flour and mixed everything together until the dough was tacky.
Most people would start kneading at this point, but I was making a no-knead bread, so the next step was to stretch and fold for 10 min, then let the dough rest for 30 min. I repeated the process 3 times, so it took 2 hours to make this bread, and it was worth the time.
Yeast bread tastes good when you let it rest and rise. I started with wholemeal flour because it makes the dough dense, and you might not need as much flour as you would with white bread. My first wholemeal bread was a disaster because I used too much flour and ended up with a shaggy dough.
This recipe can be used for both white bread and wholemeal bread; I mixed them only because I didn't want to eat either. So this combo worked perfectly for what I was craving that day!
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| Tacky dough after rest time |
Becoming A Self-Taught Baker
I've been building up my skills and equipment for months as a self-taught baker, although baking cakes and cookies has been fun. I want to focus on bread and pizza from now on, as I've considered opening my own boulangerie down the line.
It would be great to turn a passion into a source of income. I haven't made up my mind yet, but I'll keep improving myself, and I know it won't be easy since I have to learn on my own. Ideally, I want to learn the basics from a professional; however, I can't afford baking lessons at the moment.
So I'll keep trying online recipes and watching YouTube tutorials, and I think I've made a lot of progress since I started. There's a reason why I'm finally posting one of my homemade breads even though I've been baking since March lol.
My next challenge is to learn how to make sourdough bread. I've watched a few tutorials, but I still can't get it, which is annoying because it's my favourite type of bread. And I'll save so much money if I learn how to make it myself since it's pretty expensive.
My previous attempts at making sourdough bread were a complete failure, but I won't give up and will keep trying. I can't wait to show you my sourdough bread once I've successfully made it!
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| This is how I like my bread. |
Thank you for reading!
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