This recipe is so easy I make it nearly every day and I don’t measure the flour, I just toss it in there till it feels right. I measured my random scoops of flour to write out this recipe but it will vary based on your humidity levels.

Before you begin you need:

7g or 2 1/4 tsp. of yeast

350ml of water at room temperature 

1.5 tsp of salt

3 cups of white bread flour

A large clean plastic bag

A loaf tin

Butter

Stand mixer with dough hook (or just your hands for kneading)

Spatula or bowl scraper

Put the yeast and water into the bowl of your mixer. Sprinkle about a 1/2 cup of flour and stir briefly with a whisk. Let it sit for ten minutes letting yeast activate. There should be bubbles coming to the surface of the water and you should get some floating blobs of flour and yeast. 

Put the dough hook on the mixer and find your spatula or bowl scraper.

Add about a cup of flour and start mixing on a med speed, add the salt. Keep slowly adding flour till it starts to come together into a messy ball of dough. You might need to pause now and then to scrape the edges or bottom. Then knead with dough hook for another 8 min. You want smooth, elastic dough. Not dry, but not sticking to your fingers when you touch it. 

Take the dough hook away, cover bowl with clingfilm or bee’s wrap and set a timer to check it in 1-1.5 hours. It should have doubled in size. 

Gently press the air our of the dough and transfer it to the counter where you are going to press the dough flat into a vague rectangle shape. You will roll this up, tuck the ends under and put it into your buttered loaf tin. Don’t make your rectangle too wide! 

Put the loaf inside a tented plastic bag. Do not let the bag touch the dough as it rises so go for lots of rising space. 

You can put this proofing loaf into the fridge overnight and bake it in the morning. It will slowly proof while you sleep.

Preheat oven to 400

Carefully remove loaf from the bag without the bag touching the loaf. 

Bake the loaf for 30-35min. At the end remove the loaf from your pan and tap the bottom. It should sound hollow. When in doubt, another 5 min in the oven without the pan won’t hurt it a bit. 

Voila!