Basic Sandwich Loaf Recipe is easiest of all bread recipes and is perfect for beginners. Made with bread flour, they turn out light and soft.
I love baking breads with bread flour. But if you prefer maida, then you can use maida instead of bread flour in this recipe. Be careful while adding water as maida requires less water compared to bread flour.
You can also use this same recipe to make pav buns. Just divide the dough into nine equal portions for big buns and 16 pieces for mini pav buns. Use a 9″ square tin to arrange the buns. Baking time will be reduced to 25 minutes if baking as pav buns.
It is an one bowl recipe. Just place all ingredients in the same bowl and add water and oil while kneading. If using stand mixer, your work becomes more easier. Make sure that the dough is slightly sticky. When gluten develops while kneading, the consistency of the final dough will be perfect.
Cover and set aside until the dough is double in volume. You can also use a cling film to cover the bowl, so that it doesn’t dry out. Keep it in a warm place to ferment. The time taken will vary from place to place depending on the room temperature. In hot places, the first proving will just take one hour. But if the climate is cold, it might take a bit longer.
To easily find out the doubling of the dough, I follow this technique with a tiny measuring jar. Take a small portion of the dough and place it into the tiny glass jar. When the dough in the jar doubles, the main dough in the bowl also would be of same volume. You can then proceed to go to the next step of the recipe.
Once the dough is double in volume, transfer it to the counter and shape it into a log. Don’t over work the dough and don’t forget the dough in the tiny jar. Line and grease a 8″ by 4″ loaf tin and place the dough inside. Without lining the tin with parchment, your final dough might stick to the base. So don’t skip lining.
When the dough rises above the rim, it is time to bake. In OTG, I prefer 220C and in convection oven 200C. Preheat oven and set the tin in the middle rack in OTG and on the short rack in convection oven. Midway through baking, if you feel that the top is browning faster, use an aluminium foil to cover the top of the bread. This will stop the burning on top.
Once the top sounds hollow to knocks, remove the tin from oven and set it on a wire rack for five to ten minutes. Loosen the sides with a knife and then remove the bread out of tin. Allow it to cool completely. I prefer to slice the bread the next day. Overnight resting will soften up the crust.
Look how beautiful the texture of the slice is. The bread is so soft to touch and melts in your mouth. If making French toast, make sure to slice them thick.
Basic Sandwich Loaf Recipe
Ingredients
- 420 g Bread Flour / Maida
- 2 tbs Milk Powder
- 1 tsp Instant Yeast
- 225 ml – Water
- 1 ½ tbs Sugar
- 1 tsp Salt
- 2 tbs Oil
Instructions
- In a bowl mix together flour, milk powder, salt, sugar and yeast.
- Add the oil and water and mix to form soft and slightly sticky dough.
- Transfer to the counter and dust it with flour.
- Knead for 10 minutes until the dough passes the window pane test. When a small portion of the dough is stretched, it should become a thin film without breaking. It should be thin enough so that light can pass through it.
- You can also knead the dough in a stand mixer for 7-10 minutes.
- Oil a bowl and place the dough inside.
- Rotate the bowl to coat the dough with oil.
- Cover with cling wrap and set aside for 1 hour to 1 1/4 hours or until the dough is double the size.
- Now transfer the dough back to counter and press it to form a square.
- Roll the dough like a jelly roll.
- Pinch the dough for each roll until you finish rolling the square.
- Pinch ends and place the roll seam side down in a greased 8” by 4” by 4” loaf pan.
- Cover with cling wrap and set aside for 20-30 minutes or until the dough is almost double in size.
- Preheat oven to 225°C.
- Remove the cling wrap and bake the bread for 30-45 minutes in oven.
- If the bread seems to be browning fast, place an aluminium foil on top of it to slow the browning.
- Once the bread sounds hollow to tap, remove it from oven and let it rest for 5 minutes on a wire rack.
- Gently use a spatula to release the bread from the sides of the tin.
- Flip it to release the bread from tin.
- Let it cool on wire rack.
- Slice it with a long serrated bread knife only when it is completely cool.
- Enjoy!!
