Perfection kneads practice...

Dough coming together

I think the key to good bread is to perfect your kneading technique; practice makes perfect here, so get baking! If you want your bread to have a good texture and not resemble a house brick this is the place to put in the work.

Once you've mixed together your dry ingredients you should add enough warm water to your dough so it comes together to form a soft dough, but not so much that it becomes sticky, the easiest way to achieve this is to add it in stages. Once you've done this and turned your dough out onto a lightly floured surface you're ready to knead!

I’ve tried to illustrate my Gran's technique in these photos, it’s very reliable:

Dough ready to be kneaded

1. Form your dough into a circle, pull out from the edge of the dough away from you

2. Lift it back up over itself into the middle of the dough

3. Press into the centre of the dough with the heel of your hand

4. Turn the dough 45 degrees and repeat - simple!

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

Step 4

Dough halfway to smooth!

For a standard bread recipe of 1-1.5lbs flour your dough will need to be kneaded for approx. 10 minutes to make it smooth and elastic.

Leaving the dough in a warm place for approx. an hour should be sufficient for it to double in size – but don’t be afraid to leave it for longer if it hasn’t quite doubled yet. I find the top oven over a main oven which is preheating for the actual baking event is the best place to leave your dough to rise.

In oiled bowl ready to rise

The risen dough

Once you've mastered this technique a whole world of dough cookery opens up to you, it really is worth trying to perfect!

Happy Baking!

The Baking Ginger xx