This easy sandwich bread recipe, with a fluffy texture and mild flavor, is perfect for your morning French toast or your lunch sandwich with ham, butter, and cheese. This loaf of bread stays soft for many days and is made from 5 simple ingredients that you might already have at home.
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Ingredients and substitutes
Flour - Use bread flour (mine contains 13g protein per 100g of flour) for this easy bread recipe. I wouldn’t recommend replacing bread flour with all-purpose flour, as it's a very low protein content that is needed to develop gluten bonds.
Yeast - Use either instant yeast or active dry yeast. If you chose active dry yeast, you might need to add an extra 15 minutes to proofing your dough on each step. If you want to use fresh yeast, you'll need 3x more of it (18g).
Milk - The milk you use for the pre-fermented dough should be lukewarm to wake up the yeast, but the rest of the milk you add to the main dough can be at room temperature. You can also replace the milk that you use in the pre-fermented dough with the same amount of lukewarm water.
Sugar and salt – Use white granulated sugar and some salt to balance the flavors in the bread.
Butter – Unsalted butter adds richness to the flavor and makes the texture of our homemade bread softer.
Cooking tips
Pre-fermented dough, aka sponge method, gives our bread flavor – so don't skip it! This recipe can be done as a one-bowl recipe: you just wake up the yeast and then mix all the ingredients, except the butter which you add in the end in several batches. However, I highly recommend spending one extra hour to allow fermentation to do its thing and start your recipe by making a small batch of dough before mixing it with the rest of the ingredients. It affects not only the flavor but also gives your bread a more delicate crumb.
Roll your dough. This is an important step that helps to burst all the large air bubbles in the dough. I suggest you do it on a surface that’s been lightly greased with olive oil instead of lightly floured. There's no need to add more flour to our dough and it's not going to be that sticky. Also, it didn't really stick to my rolling pin, so I see no reason to flour that either.
Shape your bread. To make the perfect sandwich bread with a fine crumb, you need to shape your bread correctly. After you make a rectangle, you want to roll it into a log that you will proof in a loaf pan before baking. However, you don’t just want not just to roll it – you want to do it as tightly as possible. A tight coil will mean all the air bubbles that we get from proofing time are smaller, which will give us a finer crumb. Of course, you will get a few big bubbles here and there in the texture, but it's the magic of making bread. You never know what's inside until you slice it and every loaf is unique!
Cover with foil for the last 10 minutes of baking time. In my oven, I need to cover my loaf after 25 minutes of baking. You might need to do it a bit earlier or later. You want our bread to be an even, deep, golden-brown color on top.
Step by step directions
1. In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine all pre-fermented dough ingredients. Place in a warm place for 1 hour.
2. When the pre-fermented dough has doubled in volume, is bubbly, and has an acidic smell, add the bread flour, milk, salt, and sugar and place it in a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook attachment. Knead on medium for 3 minutes or until the dough looks more homogenous and pulls easily from the sides of the bowl, but still sticks to your hands.
3. Then add half of the butter and knead until it’s completely incorporated. Then, add the rest of the butter and knead the dough for 10-12 minutes on medium until it pulls away from the sides of the bowl and you can stretch a small piece of it into a square, creating a film thin enough for light to pass through (windowpane test). The dough won’t stick to your hands anymore and it will look hydrated, silky, and smooth.
4. Place the dough into a large mixing bowl lightly greased with olive oil, cover with plastic wrap, and leave at room temperature to proof for 1.5 to 2 hours, depending on how warm it is in your kitchen, until it doubles in volume.
5. Grease an 8" by 5" (20cm by 13cm) loaf pan with butter.
6. Remove the dough onto a lightly oiled working surface and deflate the dough. Roll it into an 8" by 15" rectangle. Then, roll the dough tightly into an 8" log and place it into the prepared pan. Cover it with plastic wrap and leave at room temperature to proof for 1 hour or until domed about 1" (2cm) above the top of the pan.
7. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 350F (175C).
8. Bake on the lowest ⅓ of the oven for 25 minutes. Then, rotate the pan and cover it loosely with a piece of foil. Bake for an additional 10 minutes or until the internal temperature is 190F (88C). The top should be a deep brown color and the bread should sound like it’s hollow inside when you tap on it.
9. Remove your homemade sandwich bread from the oven and let it rest in the pan for 3 minutes. Then, remove onto a cooling rack to cool down completely.
Possible variations
Different toppings - You can always sprinkle some crushed nuts and seeds or flaky sea salt on top of your white sandwich bread right before baking.
Add more sugar - If you love your bread a bit sweeter, you can double the amount of sugar in it.
Add nuts, seeds, raisins, etc. - The best way to add all those extra ingredients to your bread is to sprinkle them on top of your dough after you’ve rolled it out into a rectangle. Then, roll it into a log like you would do with Cinnamon rolls and proof it in your loaf pan before baking it as instructed in the recipe card.
FAQ
Wrap completely-cooled bread in plastic wrap and store it away from sunlight at room temperature for up to 4 days.
Chilling the bread will force the moisture out of it and makes it stale very fast. If you have no choice and your bread is getting moldy fast at room temperature (which happens in very warm and humid climates), store it in the fridge and reheat it slightly in the microwave before serving, or toast it.
You can freeze your bread for up to 2 months. Thaw in the fridge overnight, then reheat a bit in the microwave just until slightly warm or toast right out of the fridge.
Yes, you can use this dough to make buns.
Yes, you can use a hand mixer with a hook attachment or knead it by hand. It will, however, take more time and energy.
More bread recipes
Recipe card
Sandwich bread
Equipment
- Stand mixer or hand mixer with a hook attachment and a large mixing bowl
- 8" by 5" (20cm by 13cm) loaf pan
Ingredients
Pre-fermented dough
- 100 g bread flour
- 100 ml whole milk lukewarm
- 7 g instant yeast 1 standard package
Final dough
- all pre-fermented dough
- 200 g bread flour
- 100 ml whole milk at room temperature
- 15 g white granulated sugar
- 30 g unsalted butter
- 1 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine all pre-fermented dough ingredients. Place in a warm place for 1 hour.
- When it has doubled in volume, is bubbly, and has an acidic smell, add the bread flour, milk, salt, and sugar and place it in a stand mixer fitted with a hook attachment. Knead on medium for 3 minutes or until the dough looks more homogenous and pulls easily from the sides of the bowl, but still sticks to your hands.
- Then add half of the butter and knead until it’s completely incorporated (the dough can look like it’s disintegrating but will come back together eventually). Then, add the rest of the butter and knead the dough for 10-12 minutes on medium until it pulls away from the sides of the bowl and you can stretch a small piece of it into a square, creating a film thin enough for light to pass through (windowpane test). The dough won’t stick to your hands anymore and it will look hydrated, silky, and smooth.
- Place the dough into a large bowl lightly greased with olive oil. Cover with plastic wrap and leave at room temperature to proof for 1.5 to 2 hours, depending on how warm it is in your kitchen, until it doubles in volume.
- Grease an 8" by 5" (20cm by 13cm) loaf pan with butter.
- Remove the dough onto a lightly oiled working surface and deflate it. Roll it into an 8" by 15" rectangle. Then, roll the dough tightly into an 8" log and place it into the prepared pan. Cover it with plastic wrap and leave at room temperature to proof for 1 hour or until domed about 1" above the top of the pan.
- Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 350F (175C).
- Bake on the lowest ⅓ of the oven for 25 minutes. Then, rotate the pan and cover it loosely with a piece of foil. Bake for an additional 10 minutes or until the internal temperature is 190F (88C). The top should be a deep brown color and the bread should sound like it’s hollow inside when you tap on it.
- Remove from the oven and let the bread rest in the pan for 3 minutes. Then, remove onto a cooling rack to cool down completely.
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