Baking Bread Ingredients every baker must have in the pantry, so you can make a freshly baked loaf any time!
Bread can be made with only 4 ingredients, flour, water, yeast and salt, and there’s a good number of recipes to make different types of bread at home with these ingredients, from flat bread to white bread, but as you keep baking, you will discover some other ingredients that will help you to bake more types of bread.
Everytime you go to the grocery store, take with you you’re shopping list and have at home fresh ingredients to make bread at home anytime.
Baking Bread Ingredients Must Have At In Your Pantry
1 – Flour
Flour is the main ingredient in any bread recipe, it will give to any bread its own structure, as you knead the dough, it will form the gluten, the flour protein, which will form a web that traps air bubbles.
There is also some simple sugars in flour, which will feed the yeast while you make your bread, if your recipe doesn’t tell you to add sugar is OK, the raising time will be longer but you will get good results too.
Keep flour in a closed container in a dark place, and put a piece of tape with the date you opened the package.
2 – Liquids
When working on a bread recipe, it might have water of milk as liquids, each one of them will add to your bread a different flavor, and will help to form the structure in bread.
Liquids will steam while baking and steam will help to build up the tenderness of the bread, while a recipe with water tends to form hard crust, milk will help you to bake soft breads.
When using water, you can use water from the tab or from a bottle, in case the recipe ask for milk, always keep the milk in the fridge and use the milk as the recipe says, cold or warm.
3 – Salt
Salt on bread recipes is an essential ingredient, and it must be measured carefully, don’t skip it on your recipe as salt helps to provide structure to any bread. When baking yeast bread, salt will help to retard the raising time, and it will help bread dough to develop its own flavor.
Keep salt in its box in the pantry or in the kitchen counter.
4 – Yeast
Yeast has existed for a long time, and is considered a plant-like microorganism.
It works as a leavening in bread, to make the bread rise, and does this by feeding on the sugars in flour, and producing carbon dioxide that makes the dough expand.
Keep dry yeast always in a glass container in the fridge, some bakers say it can be kept in the freezer and take the amount you need out one hour before you make the bread dough.
5 – Fats
Each bread recipe will let you know what type of fat you should add to the recipe, the most common fats used in bread making are: oils, butter and shortening. When you add fat to a bread recipe, it will help to coat the gluten molecules, so they won’t combine as easily.
Fats in bread will help you to deliver more flavor to your bread and also more tenderness, recipes with fat on it, will help your bread to last longer.
Keep butter in the fridge and use it as the recipe requires it, in case is said room temperature, take butter out of the fridge one hour or two before making the dough.
6 – Sweeteners
The most known sweetener in bread recipes is sugar, as it’s considered as the main food for the yeast, it will help to grow and multiply as your dough raises.
Sweeteners will give a sweet taste to any bread and it will also help to get a nice browning while baking.
Keep sugar in closed glass or plastic containers.
7 – Eggs
There are many bread recipes that don’t contain any eggs, and your bread will be a good taste and more like a rustic bread, recipes that contains eggs in it, tend to be more elaborate and will add more flavor to the bread.
Breads recipes that contains eggs, will help you to make softer breads and more flavored, the keeping time of the bread will be longer, and these breads can be used as an ingredient for other food recipes, or as a base to prepare a good sandwich or a dessert.
Keep eggs in the fridge, and take them out of the fridge if the recipe ask for room temperature eggs.
What Are The Best Baking Bread Ingredients
After being baking for a few years, I learned to get always the fresher ingredients you can get, as sometimes is not easy and you only can get what you find in the grocery store near your place.
From experience, when you need to buy baking ingredients from a regular store, always pay attention to each product date, as many times you will find products with old dates in front of the shelves, as you get more experienced, you will know how to choose the fresher ingredients.
How Much Quantity To Buy From Each Ingredient
As a home baker, you might be only baking for the family needs, so you don’t need to buy big amounts of each ingredient.
Flour, sugar, salt and yeast, are products that are sold in packages, each product will share the date, you might need to pay attention to each product date, so it doesn’t go overdue.
As you start baking at home, buy just what you need to start, to make one or two recipes, as you get more experience about what bread recipes are your family favorites, you will know how much to buy from each ingredient and how often.
It’s also well-known by professional bakers, people love to eat more bread during cold Winter months, and we all love to eat lighter recipes during the warm months of Summer.
Baking Bread Ingredients To Have In Your Pantry – Closing Thoughts
As a beginner baker, you will start testing some bread recipes, after testing a few, you will notice some different bread recipes are made with the same ingredients, some will have one or two eggs, and some recipes will have none, the same will happen with the other ingredients, but you can be sure when you have all these ingredients in your pantry, you can have everything you need anytime you want to bake a freshly baked bread for your next meal!
Soon you will know which recipes are your favorite and you will know what other ingredients to have in your pantry, as some breads can be made by adding some other foods like nuts, raising, cinnamon, chocolate, grains and others.
Once you start baking at home, you will see the benefits of a freshly baked bread, then you’ll be one more member of the club!
Keep trying new recipes and soon you’ll be an expert!
Happy Baking!
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