Baking Bread: How to Make Homemade Bread With Just 4 Ingredients

Rye, wholemeal or mixed bread: A slice of fresh bread tastes good at any time of the day and is also a quick and healthy snack for in between. If you are looking for a special taste experience, you should bake bread yourself – with our instructions, this also works for beginners.

• To bake bread yourself, you only need a few ingredients: flour, yeast, water, and salt.
• The type and type of flour determine the taste of the bread.
• The most important component in baking bread: time.

A crispy crust on the outside, a soft dough on the inside: this is what bread should taste like for most people. If you want to be sure that there are no additives or preservatives in the bread, it is best to bake your loaf yourself. It’s not difficult – you only need a few ingredients and a little time.

Bake your own bread: the ingredients

For a loaf of bread with about 20 slices you will need:

• 500g flour
• ½ packet of fresh yeast
• water
• 1 tsp salt

Which flour is suitable for baking bread?

Important to know: The flour determines the taste of your bread. Would you prefer a hearty rye bread or a light, soft wheat bread? The less the grain is ground, the stronger the flavor and the higher the vitamin and mineral content.

The type number of the flour reveals how heavily the grain was ground. The widely used wheat flour type 405, for example, contains 405 milligrams of minerals per 100 grams of flour. Flours with a lower type number are smoother and finer – and well suited for baking. Flours with a higher number of types are coarser. They therefore do not absorb the water as well and are more difficult to bake into bread. Wholemeal flour does not have a type number because it contains all grain components (flour, husk and germ) and the mineral content varies depending on the harvest.

Wheat flour works well for homemade bread, as does spelled flour. Rye flour, on the other hand, only rises nicely as sourdough – sourdough breads are a little more difficult to bake, but they usually last longer than wheat breads. We recommend these types of flour for baking bread:

• For white bread and light mixed bread: wheat flour type 405 and 550, rye flour type 997, spelled flour type 630
• For darker and coarser mixed breads: wheat type 1050, rye type 1150, spelled type 812
• For dark, strong mixed breads: wheat type 1700, rye type 1800, spelled type 1050

If you want to experiment, you can also mix wheat, rye, or spelled flour.

Step by step: The recipe for homemade bread

Pour 250 milliliters of lukewarm water into a bowl and crumble in the yeast bit by bit. Then stir with a whisk until the yeast has completely dissolved. Let the yeast water stand for a few minutes.

Then put 500 grams of flour in a large bowl and dig a well in the middle. Now pour the yeast water into the hollow with the flour. Also add the salt and – if you like – half a teaspoon of sugar. Now knead the bread vigorously for about ten minutes so that a smooth dough is formed. Kneading the dough works just as well with a hand mixer (with kneading sticks).

Cover the bread dough with a kitchen towel and let it “rise” in a warm place for at least half an hour. The volume should roughly double during this time. If your dough hasn’t risen after half an hour, give it a little more time.

After resting, knead the dough again briefly. If you like, you can add sunflower seeds or other seeds to the dough. Shape the bread dough into an oval loaf and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. You can cut the surface of the bread diagonally several times with a sharp knife. Cover and let the dough rise again for about 20 minutes.

After about 15 minutes, preheat the oven to 200°C (top/bottom heat) or 175°C (convection). Then place the bread in the oven and place a small, heatproof bowl of water on the bottom of the oven.

The bread should bake for 40 to 45 minutes depending on your oven. The best way to check if the bread is done is to tap the bottom of the loaf. If it sounds hollow, the bread is done. If not, return the bread to the oven and continue baking for a few more minutes.

8 tips for baking bread

• Weigh the ingredients carefully so that the dough does not become too soft.
• If things need to go faster, many use ready-made bread baking mixes from the shops. Our test of 20 bread mixes shows that acrylamide was produced in almost all of the mixes during baking. The substance is considered to be probably carcinogenic to humans. In addition, almost all products contained mineral oil.
• People with celiac disease (gluten intolerance) should not eat wheat flour or spelled flour, as both contain gluten. Buckwheat, on the other hand, is gluten-free and also suitable for baking bread.
• If you only add the salt before kneading, then the gluten can unfold undisturbed.
• Put a bowl of water in the oven to make the bread crust even crispier.
• Another crispy tip: bake your bread in a closed roaster. A pizza stone on which the bread is placed in the oven is also a practical tool that makes the bread crispier.
• The less yeast the bread contains, the better the flavor and the longer the bread stays fresh.
• Fresh yeast will keep in the fridge for about two weeks, while dried yeast will keep for several months at room temperature.