Easy gluten free bread (basic white with sourdough texture)
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Category
Bread
Servings
12
Prep Time
15 minutes
Cook Time
65 minutes
Proofing time
75 minutes
This is our basic white bread recipe using the YOMO bread mix. It’s super easy to make and can be made with corn starch or potato starch, depending on your dietary requirements. This gluten free bread is soft in the middle with a crusty outside – a yeast bread with a texture similar to a sourdough. You really need to use a weigh scale when making bread because precision is important. The bread will be lovely and soft on the first day and you may eat the whole loaf. If you don’t, you can slice and freeze or wrap tightly in plastic to keep it fresh. Because there are no preservatives or additives, the bread will become firmer after the first day. Like sourdough, it is delicious toasted and you can make it soft again the next day if you want to make a sandwich by toasting it very lightly.
Recipe Note:
There are three stages below – making, proofing and baking your gluten free loaf – the “making” can be done with either a stand mixer eg Kenwood chef, KitchenAid etc, or by hand. It’s a bit faster to use a stand mixer but it’s also super satisfying to knead your own bread – the two methods will give you comparable results when you follow the instructions!
Ingredients
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Weigh scale – this is critical
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Stand mixer OR a big bowl and a bench to knead on
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Baking tin – the ideal size is approx. 110mm wide x 180mm long x 100mm high
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Large heat proof bowl to fill with boiling water for proofing
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Kettle
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Oven
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Spatula
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1 x YOMO bread mix (290g pouch) or from bulk
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170g of corn starch OR 170g of potato starch
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6g of dry yeast
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400g water (room temp)
Equipment
Ingredients
Directions
Making your loaf
For a stand mixer:
Combine bread mix, yeast, potato starch OR corn starch and water in the bowl of your stand mixer.
Use your normal beater, NOT the dough hook.
Start mixing the dough on low speed – the dough will come together quickly – but we do not stop there…
Once the dough has come together, we are going to “break it” – this means mixing it hard at an increased speed until the dough becomes less firm that it was initially.
When it is “breaking”, it will come apart and stick to the sides of the bowl when you beat very fast – do this for 2-3 min.
Stop the mixer and gather the dough back together with a spatula.
Use your hands to make an oval ball.
Transfer your dough ball to the loaf tin and push it in to ensure it is evenly distributed – score your loaf on the top to allow it to rise unconstrained.
For hand kneading:
Combine bread mix, yeast, potato OR corn starch and water in a large bowl.
Use a spoon or spatula to mix the ingredients - when they start to come together, get your hands in there and start kneading.
Once the mixture is homogenous, transfer to a clean bench or flat surface where you can work the dough hard for 8-10 min.
Bring it together and then push it apart with the heel of your hand – don’t try to keep it in a nice pile, your aim is to “break” the dough, and then put it back together again.
When it is “breaking”, it will become stickier so if it’s sticking to your surface – good job – use a spatula to scrape it off and back into the pile.
Gather the dough back together.
Use your hands to make an oval ball
Transfer your dough ball to the loaf tin and push it in to ensure it is evenly distributed – score your loaf on the top to allow it to rise unconstrained.
Proofing your loaf
You now need to create a nice space for your dough to prove. If you have a proven method that you know gets good results, you can do this. If not, you need to prove your loaf in the oven as per steps 9-11 below.
Leave the oven OFF and add a heat proof bowl of boiling water at the bottom of your oven – use ~1.5L of boiling water – this will create a moist environment for the loaf to rise.
Put your loaf above the boiling water (on the shelf that you usually bake on) and close the oven door.
Leave your dough to rise for about 1hr and 15min – the loaf should approx. double in size.
Baking your loaf
Remove the proofing bowl and water from the oven
Turn your oven on to 175 degrees C and put a timer on for 1 hr and 5 min - I find my gas oven is a lot cooler than my electric oven so you may need to crank it up to 185 if you know that your oven runs a bit cool.
Set a time for 40 min – at this point you can brush the top of your loaf with water or olive oil to stop it from drying out too much.
Check your loaf at 1 hr 5 min – it should be hard on top so that you can knock on it and get a nice sound.
Once baked, tip your loaf out of the tin and allow it to cool on a wire cooling rack.
Allow your loaf to cool completely – if you try to cut it too early it will be VERY hard to cut and misshapen by the end of your efforts – it is very soft inside with a firm crust! It is very hard to resist but you must! Enjoy.
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