Easy Homemade Bread Recipe (Step-by-Step!)

Learn exactly how to make homemade bread from scratch — soft, fluffy, and perfect every time. Just 5 ingredients, beginner-friendly instructions, and done in about 2 hours. Thousands of raving comments & 5-star reviews!

Thousands of comments & reviewers agree this is the BEST homemade loaf for both beginners and expert bakers.

Homemade Bread is one of my favorite foods of all time. Can you tell by the name of this site?! There really is nothing quite like a warm slice of fresh bread served with a thick pat of butter on top. Mmmmm! This recipe is perfect. It’s simple to follow, takes about 2 hours to make and yields 2 loaves of wonderful bread.

It’s quite versatile too, so feel free to use part whole wheat flour if you’d like. Brush butter on top when it’s out of the oven and partially cooled and everyone will thank you.

Basic Steps for Making Basic Yeast Bread Recipes

If you’ve never made bread before, here is the basic formula for making your own at home. My recipe below follows this perfectly. It’s so much easier and trust me, the scent of fresh bread baking will make everyone really, really excited for dinner!

Step 1: Assemble Bread Ingredients

You’ll need warm water, granulated sugar, instant OR active dry yeast, salt, vegetable or canola oil and flour. That’s it!

Step 2: Dissolve the yeast and activate it by Proofing

This is a simple process that takes about 5 minutes. You can see a picture below what yeast looks like when it’s proofed. It’s possible to kill yeast if you use too hot of water, so aim for slightly warmer than luke-warm, or about 105°F. Combine warm water, yeast and 1 TBSP of the granulated sugar in your mixing bowl. Give it a quick stir and then let it sit for 5 minutes. You’ll begin to see the yeast puff up until it covers the entire surface of the water.

Step 3: Add remaining ingredients and mix

Add the rest of the sugar, the oil, salt and flour (You can use all-purpose flour OR bread flour!), then mix using an electric mixer until it’s well combined, about 2 minutes. You can mix by hand but it will take longer.

Step 4: Knead the Bread

You might be thinking, “Wait! It’s already mixed!” Ha! Not so fast! Going through the process of kneading bread dough is crucial for bread with great texture. Kneading dough allows gluten to form which enables dough to rise better, be lighter and fluffier. you can knead by hand or with a mixer. I use the dough hook on my mixer and knead for 7 minutes. If you knead by hand, you’ll want to knead for 10-11 minutes, depending on how consistent you are.

Step 5: First Rise

Place your lovely smooth, elastic bread dough in an oiled bowl and cover it with plastic wrap or a clean towel. I think plastic wrap works better because it traps hot air inside and thus, my dough requires a shorter first rise. Be sure to spray the side of the plastic wrap that will touch the dough with oil!

If your house is cool, your bread will take longer to rise. In the wintertime when my house is cooler than normal, I like to turn the oven on for 2-3 minutes, then turn it off and let the bowl of dough rise in there. The oven traps the heat for a longtime and it’s the perfect atmosphere for rising dough.

Step 6: Punch Dough and Shape it

Punching the dough down quickly releases any air pockets that have developed and helps your bread have a more consistent rise and texture. Shape your dough by rolling it gently into a ball and rolling it 2 or 3 times on the countertop so that the ball is more oblong. I usually punch down and shape the dough quickly, then place in a greased bread pan.

Step 7: Second Rise

I like to do my second rise in a warm oven that’s not turned on. I turn the oven on just before I punch my dough down, then turn it off once I place the dough in the oven for the 2nd rise. It’s really only on for a minute or two, which is fine! The second rise will help shape your loaf of bread and takes about 30 minutes.

Step 8: Bake the Bread

You’re nearly there! Bread bakes for about 30-40 minutes. You know what I do to make sure my bread is perfectly cooked? I use a digital cooking thermometer! Fully cooked bread will be 190-200 degrees F. Bread recipes that include milk will need to cook until 200 degrees, but since this one doesn’t, I take it out once it reaches 190 degrees. The top will be golden brown.

My all-time favorite cooking thermometer is the Thermapen. It’s super fast and incredibly durable. Another great thermometer is the ThermoPop which is a more basic version that works just as well!

Step 9: Cool the Bread

Cool baked bread in the pan for 10-15 minutes, then overturn pan and turn loaf out onto a cooling rack or folded towel to finish cooling. If you leave the bread in the pan for much longer than that, you’ll steam it, which may cause some parts of your loaf to go soggy. No one likes soggy bread!

BEST BREAD PAN?

I bake a lot of bread and the pans I prefer are either ceramic, glass or cast iron. These pans will bake bread more evenly and release the bread more easily after baking.  I don’t like using dark or nonstick pans because the bread cooks unevenly. It darkens on the outside before the bread is cooked on the inside, so the coloring is uneven. Read more about which bread pan is the best here!

Easy Homemade Bread Recipe

Here are the ingredients for the oven baked recipe, which yields 2 loaves of bread:

— WATER: You need 2 cups warm water. (110° F/45° C) I recommend you take the temperature using a cooking thermometer until you get the hang of how warm the water should be. If your water is too hot, it will kill the yeast and your bread will be dense and flat!

— SUGAR: We add 1/2 cup white sugar. You are welcome to reduce this even further and use just 1/4 cup.

— YEAST: We add 1 TBSP + 2 tsp active dry yeast to the dough to help it rise.

— SALT: You need 1 1/2 teaspoons salt to enhance the flavors in the bread. If you’ve never had bread with not enough salt, it does not taste good! I forgot to add it once. Don’t do that.

— OIL: We used 1/4 cup vegetable oil but you can also use coconut oil or canola oil. I’ve tried it with light olive oil and it just has a strange aftertaste that I don’t love.

— FLOUR: You’ll need 5-6 cups flour. You can use all-purpose flour OR bread flour!

How to Make 5 Star Homemade Bread

In a large bowl, or a stand mixer, dissolve the sugar in the warm water. I just combine the two and whisk it slightly to dissolve the sugar. Stir in yeast. Allow to proof until yeast resembles a creamy foam, about 5 minutes.

Add in the salt and oil. Begin to mix, using a rubber scraper or the dough hook on your stand mixer. Add the flour one cup at a time, reserving the last cup of flour to see if you need it. You might not use all of the flour. The dough should pull away and clean the bowl, sticking on the bottom in a small circle about the size of a quarter. If your dough does this with just 5 cups of flour, do not add more. However, if your dough still sticks to the bowl, add more a couple tablespoons at a time until it cleans the bowl, sticking in just a small circle on the bottom.

Now knead dough for 7 minutes. Set a timer as a full knead is important! Place in a well oiled bowl, and turn dough to coat. Cover with a damp cloth. Allow to rise in a warm area until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

Punch dough down. Knead for 1 minute and divide dough in half. Shape into loaves and place into two greased 9×5 inch loaf pans. Allow to rise for 30 minutes, or until dough has risen 1 inch above pans.

Bake at 350° F (175° C) for 30-40 minutes. Cool, brush with butter and enjoy!

How can you tell if bread is fully baked?

I like to use a food thermometer. Mine is digital, so it’s very easy to use. Fully cooked bread will be 190-200 degrees F. Bread recipes that include milk will need to cook until 200 degrees, but since this one doesn’t, I take it out once it reaches 190 degrees. The top will be golden brown.

AVOID SUNKEN BREAD

The easiest and best way to avoid sunken bread is to use a cooking thermometer to check the inside of the loaf. Fully cooked bread will register 200°F on a thermometer. My all-time favorite thermometer is the Thermapen. It’s super fast and incredibly durable. Another great cooking thermometer is the ThermoPop which is a more basic version that works just as well!

Instant or Active Dry Yeast for Making Bread

If you use instant yeast, you can add it directly to your other dry ingredients when making bread. If you use active dry yeast, you’ll need to first dissolve it in warm water before using it in a recipe. For the sake of ease, I just always buy instant yeast. BUT, this recipe works for both!

Can you Make this bread in a Bread Machine? YES! Here’s how:

I’ve found this recipe works really well in a bread machine! I just had the halve the ingredients so it would fit. You can see and print out the recipe below.

Bread Machine Ingredients

You’ll use the same ingredients, only HALF of them, so you can fit them in a 1-lb bread machine.

— WATER: You need 1 cup warm water. (110° F/45° C)

— SUGAR: We add 1/4 cup white sugar. You are welcome to reduce this even further and use just 1-2 tablespoons.

— YEAST: We add 2 1/2 tsp active dry yeast to the dough to help it rise.

— SALT: You need 3/4 teaspoons salt to enhance the flavors in the bread. If you’ve never had bread with not enough salt, it’s… not good. I forgot to add it once. Don’t do that.

— OIL: We used 2 TBSP vegetable oil but you can also use coconut oil or canola oil. I’ve tried it with light olive oil and it just has a strange aftertaste that I don’t love.

— FLOUR: You’ll need 3 cups flour. You can use all-purpose flour OR bread flour!

Making your Loaf of Bread in a Bread Machine

Add the ingredients to the bread pan of your machine in the following order: water, oil, flour, sugar and salt. Make a small well in the dry ingredients and add yeast.

Place bread pan in machine. Close lid and set bread machine to bake a loaf of basic white bread.

Let bread cool when bread machine has completed the full cycle. (Mine takes 3.5 hours.) Remove from machine & pan. Brush with butter and enjoy!

How to Store Basic Bread

You’ll want to store leftover bread in an airtight container. I bought bread bags off Amazon and LOVE them!

Once you have some experience making a few loaves of this bread, you’ll have to try other bread recipes of mine! Our buttermilk bread is very popular for its soft, feathery texture. Want to try a shaped bread? This Braided Sweet Bread is heavenly- and it’s easy, I promise! If you want a nostalgic soft loaf of white bread that’s perfect for sandwiches, we’ve got you covered with our Soft White Bread. This Honey Oat Bread has fantastic flavor, or if you want to take a break from yeast, you’ve got to check out our No-Yeast Wheat Bread.

Easy 5 Star Homemade Bread recipe made with simple ingredients & detailed instructions showing how to make bread! Thousands of comments & reviewers agree this is the BEST homemade bread for both beginners and expert bakers.