Easy White Bread - Perfect for Beginners

Try the homemade buttermilk bread recipe next!

Jump to:

• ❤️ Why you'll love this recipe
• 🧾 Ingredients
• 🔪 Instructions
• 📖 Variations
• Related recipes
• 📖 Recipe
• 💬 Comments

❤️ Why you'll love this recipe

This easy white bread is made from scratch with just a few basic ingredients.

The recipe makes two loaves of the BEST homemade bread and is perfect for new bakers. Soft and buttery on the inside with a crisp, golden crust - this has been pleasing families just like yours for centuries!

If you've never worked with yeast dough before I suggest reading my complete guide to working with yeast doughs before you start this recipe. It has a ton of information that will make you an experienced baker in no time!

🧾 Ingredients

This is a traditional homemade bread, one that is probably very similar to what your grandmother or great-grandmother made.

You don't need to use a special flour, all purpose flour is fine. That means that you can knead it by hand without too much trouble.

• All purpose flour - gives the dough structure and holds the air bubbles that the yeast gives off during rising. Click here to find out more about different types of flours.
• Active dry yeast easts the sugars in the dough and gives off a gas. This is what causes it to rise.
• Ginger gets the yeast going. Think of it as the bread's first cup of coffee in the morning. It's called an activator. Check out this article if you're wondering about other possible yeast activators.
• Sugar feeds the yeast and helps it to grow.
• Milk gives the texture a delicate softness. You can actually use all water if you like.
• Butter helps the crumb stay soft and gives it more flavor.
• Salt enhances the flavor and keeps it from rising too much.
• Water adds moisture and helps the other ingredients to blend. If you've had trouble getting yeast to grow it may be too much chlorine in your water. Try using bottled water and see if that works better.

🔪 Instructions

1. Sprinkle yeast, ginger and a pinch of sugar on the water. Stir to dissolve and let it stand until bubbly.
2. Stir the sugar and butter into the warm milk and set aside until it has cooled to 110F degrees.
3. Add the milk mixture.
4. Add to the mixer bowl.
5. Add 3 cups of the flour.
6. Beat at medium speed about 2 minutes or stir by hand until batter is smooth.
7. Switch to the dough hook and add enough remaining flour to form a dough that leaves the sides of the bowl.
8. Let rest for 10 minutes then knead until smooth and elastic.
9. Form into a ball, cover, and let rise 1-½ hours.

Form loaves

1. Punch the dough down.
2. Form into two oblong loaves.
3. Fit into bread bans and let rise until double.
4. Bake until golden. Remove from oven and brush with butter.
5. Let cool and slice.
6. Store tightly wrapped for up to 2 days at room temperature or freeze for up to 3 months.

How to tell if the dough has doubled

When dough has doubled you can make a dent in it with your finger and it won't fill back in. It will be very soft and puffy as shown here.

📖 Variations

One of the reasons I love making homemade breads so much is there are so many little things you can do to change it up! Here are a few of my favorites -

• Add 1 ½ cups of raisins during kneading.
• Use honey in place of the sugar.
• Use brown sugar.
• You can substitute almond, soy, oat, or other non-dairy product for the milk. You can even leave the milk out and use plain water.
• You can use any light flavored oil instead of butter.
• Pinch off balls of dough and use as dinner rolls.
• Add an envelope of dry onion soup mix during mixing for onion bread or rolls.

Need to adjust for high altitude? Check out the instructions from Utah State University.

Related recipes

Once you've worked with homemade yeast dough it's hard to stop! Here are some more great recipes to try.

• Honey Oatmeal Bread is a soft, slightly sweet sandwich loaf with the old fashioned goodness of oatmeal and honey. Makes toast! You can also shape this dough into homemade sandwich or dinner rolls.
• No Knead English Muffin Toasting Bread is an easy, homemade bread with the texture and flavor of an English muffin. Perfect toasted and served warm with butter and honey.
• Amish Milk Bread is an old fashioned yeast loaf that's soft and slightly sweet with that good, from scratch flavor!

You'll find even more homemade bread recipes here!

Nothing smells as good as homemade bread baking in the oven!

When my dad was alive it was almost like he had an internal radar. I am not necessarily a scheduled kind of person but just about the time I put a loaf to cool on the counter he would knock at my door...The heels were his favorite and I rarely had intact loaf by the time he left.

The heels were all gone.

Thank God we get to keep our memories even after our loved ones are gone. The are priceless aren't they??

If you click on the number of servings in the recipe card you can adjust the measurements up or down for the exact number of servings you need. Don't forget that you can click on "add to collection" to save it to your own, private recipe box!

If you love this recipe please give it 5 stars! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

📖 Recipe

Originally published June 2007 - this post has been updated for easier to understand instructions and better reader experience. Last updated March 6, 2020.