With step-by-step pictures, a full video tutorial, and plenty of helpful tips, learn how to make simple white sandwich bread using a few baking ingredients like flour, water, yeast, salt, and milk. Bread flour promises a super soft interior with an extra chewy crust. This recipe yields 1 loaf, so it’s perfect if you only have 1 loaf pan.
If you’re new to working with yeast, reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs. This recipe is brought to you in partnership with Red Star Yeast.
Let’s make homemade sandwich bread. This is a basic staple in any bread baker’s repertoire, but it’s also a recipe that shouldn’t be overlooked. There’s nothing on earth quite like homemade bread and my recipe is loaf perfectionโrising tall, tasting buttery-soft, and making the most epic sandwiches. It’s truthfully the best homemade bread I’ve ever tasted and it all comes from just 7 ingredients. And if you’re nervous to bake with yeast, I guarantee you will finally feel confident with this no-fuss recipe.
This Sandwich Bread Is:
- Soft white bread with an extra chewy exterior
- Crisp right out of the oven!
- Made from 7 easy ingredients
- Golden brown with a super impressive rise
- Extraordinary on its own or as the base of a sandwich
- Simple to make
- Easy to make ahead or freeze
Looking for a no yeast alternative? Here’s my no yeast bread.
Just 1 Loaf of Bread
Besides the simplicity of the process, you’ll appreciate that this sandwich bread recipe yields just 1 loaf. You don’t need a crazy amount of flour, multiple loaf pans, and you’re not left with 2-3 leftover loaves on your hands. (Which wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing.) Just 1 loaf to prepare, rise, shape, and bakeโconvenient, approachable, and straightforward. My recipes for multigrain bread, homemade cinnamon swirl bread, and honey oat bread both produce just 1 loaf as well.
Overview: How to Make Sandwich Bread
- Make the dough. Continue below to learn more about this dough recipe.
- Knead the dough. Reference my How to Knead Dough video tutorial for extra help with this step.
- Cover the dough and let it rise. The dough rises in about 1-2 hours in a relatively warm environment.
- Punch down the dough to release the air.
- Shape the dough into a large rectangle, then roll it into loaf.
- Let the loaf rise for about 1 hour.
- Bake for 30-34 minutes until golden brown.
As shown in the video tutorial below, the dough comes together with a mixer. You can use a paddle attachment or a dough hook. You can also make the dough by hand, but it requires a bit of arm muscle. After the dough comes together in the mixing bowl, itโs time to knead. You can continue beating the dough with the mixer for this step or you can knead the dough by hand. If youโre new to bread baking, my how to knead dough post and video can help with this step.
Sandwich Bread Ingredients
You need 7 ingredientsโpractically the same as my homemade cinnamon swirl bread but less sugar. Likewise, they’re basically the same ingredients as my soft dinner rolls too, but in order to bake a bread that rises tall and has legitimate structure, we’ll leave out some of the fat. Swap some of the milk for water and leave out the egg.
- Water: Liquid activates yeast. I use mostly water in this dough because we need a bread that has structure. Using all milk, like I do for my dinner rolls, would yield a flimsy bread without much texture.
- Milk: To make a soft bread, you need fat in the dough so make sure 1/4 cup of the liquid is milk. Low fat milk works too, but whole milk produces phenomenal texture.
- Yeast: You can use active dry yeast or instant yeast. If using active dry, the rise times will be a bit longer. I recommend Platinum Yeast from Red Star, which is an instant yeast blended with natural dough improvers. It’s my go-to for all bread.
- Sugar: Sugar feeds the yeast, increases its activity, and tenderizes the dough.
- Butter: Butter promises a flavorful loaf. I tested this recipe with melted butter, softened butter, and even olive oil. We liked the loaf made with softened butter the best because it had pronounced buttery flavor and a softer (yet still sturdy) interior.
- Salt: You canโt make flavorful bread without salt!
- Flour: You can use all-purpose flour or bread flour. All-purpose flour is convenient for most, but bread flour produces a chewier crust. There are no other changes to the recipe if you use bread flour. For best taste, I highly recommend bread flour. It’s what I always use when I make artisan bread. If you wish to use whole wheat flour, follow my recipe for whole wheat bread instead.
After you make and knead the dough, let it rise. Then, punch it down to release the air:
Roll it out into an 8×15-inch rectangle:
Roll it up tightly starting with the 8-inch side, so you have an 8-inch roll to fit into your 9×5-inch loaf pan. (Unlike cinnamon rolls where you roll up the dough starting with the larger side.) Let it rise until it’s 1 heaping inch above the rim of the pan:
Bake until golden brown, about 30-34 minutes.
Uses for Homemade Sandwich Bread
- Any sandwich. Like the Ross Geller’s Turkey Moist-Maker Sandwich ๐
- BLT or grilled cheese
- Avocado toast or bacon & egg sandwiches
- Soup dipper
- Make croutons
- French toast or Blueberry French Toast Casserole
- Or in savory recipes like Breakfast Casserole and Sausage & Herb Stuffing
But our favorite way is simply warm toast with regular butter or honey butter & jam. Honestly, toast made from mass-produced bread doesn’t even compare. You can actually taste the soft and buttery toasty crumbs here. Or make an easy turkey sandwichโstore-bought bread can’t make a sandwich taste as PERFECT as this.
I understand there’s a major convenience with store-bought bread and I’m not asking you to only make homemade bread for the rest of you life, but try it at least once. It takes a few hours one afternoon and most of the work is hands-off while the dough rises. Fresh-baked sandwich bread smells incredible, tastes even better, and I’m confident there’s no better baked good than this perfect loaf. You won’t regret trying this.
More Easy Bread Recipes
- Focaccia
- Multigrain Bread
- Artisan Bread
- Cheesy Breadsticks
- Pizza Crust
- Homemade Soft Pretzels
- Bread Bowls
- Homemade Breadsticks
- Olive Bread
- Cranberry Nut No-Knead Bread
Sandwich Bread
- Prep Time: 3 hours, 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 32 minutes
- Total Time: 4 hours
- Yield: 1 loaf
- Category: Bread
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
You only need 7 ingredients to make this simple sandwich bread. Soft and buttery with a chewy/crisp crust, this fresh loaf of bread will quickly become a staple in your kitchen. See recipe notes for freezing and overnight instructions. You can also reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs.ย
Ingredients
- 1 cup (240ml) water, warmed to about 110ยฐF (43ยฐC)
- 1/4 cup (60ml) whole milk, warmed to about 110ยฐF (43ยฐC)
- 2 and 1/4 teaspoons (7g) Platinum Yeast from Red Star instant yeast (1 standard packet)
- 2 Tablespoons (25g) granulated sugar
- 4 Tablespoons (1/4 cup; 56g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 3 and 1/3 cups (about 420โ430g) all-purpose flour or bread flour (spooned & leveled), plus more as needed
Instructions
- Prepare the dough: Whisk the warm water, warm milk, yeast, and sugar together in the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with a dough hook attachment. Cover and allow to sit for 5 minutes.
- Add the butter, salt, and 1 cup flour. Beat on low speed for 30 seconds, scrape down the sides of the bowl with a silicone spatula, then add another cup of flour. Beat on medium speed until relatively incorporated (there may still be chunks of butter). Add the remaining flour and beat on medium speed until the dough comes together and pulls away from the sides of the bowl, about 2 minutes. *If you do not own a mixer, you can mix this dough with a large wooden spoon or silicone spatula. It will take a bit of arm muscle!*
- Knead the dough:ย Keep the dough in the mixer and beat for an additional 5โ8 full minutes, or knead by hand on a lightly floured surface for 5โ8 full minutes. (If you’re new to bread-baking, my How to Knead Dough video tutorial can help here.) If the dough becomes too sticky during the kneading process, sprinkle 1 teaspoon of flour at a time on the dough or on the work surface/in the bowl to make a soft, slightly tacky dough. Do not add more flour than you need; you do not want a dry dough. After kneading, the dough should still feel a little soft. Poke it with your fingerโif it slowly bounces back, your dough is ready to rise. You can also do a “windowpane test” to see if your dough has been kneaded long enough: tear off a small (roughly golfball-size) piece of dough and gently stretch it out until it’s thin enough for light to pass through it. Hold it up to a window or light. Does light pass through the stretched dough without the dough tearing first? If so, your dough has been kneaded long enough and is ready to rise. If not, keep kneading.
- 1st Rise: Lightly grease a large bowl with olive oil or nonstick spray. Place the dough in the bowl, turning it to coat all sides in the oil. Cover the bowl and allow the dough to rise in a relatively warm environment for 1-2 hours or until double in size. (I always let it rise on the counter. Takes about 2 hours. For a tiny reduction in rise time, see my answer to Where Should Dough Rise? in my Baking with Yeast Guide.)
- Grease a 9×5-inch loaf pan.
- Shape the bread: When the dough is ready, punch it down to release the air. Lightly flour a work surface, your hands, and a rolling pin. Roll the dough out into a large rectangle, about 8×15 inches. It does not have to be perfectโin fact, it will probably be rounded on the edges. That’s ok! Roll it up into an 8 inch log and place in the prepared loaf pan.
- 2nd Rise:ย Cover shaped loaf with aluminum foil, plastic wrap, or a clean kitchen towel. Allow to rise until it’s about 1 inch above the top of the loaf pan, about 1 hour. (See video and photo above for a visual.)
- Adjust oven rack to a lower position and preheat oven to 350ยฐF (177ยฐC). (It’s best to bake the bread towards the bottom of the oven so the top doesn’t burn.)
- Bake the bread: Bake for 32-36 minutes or until golden brown on top. If you notice the top browning too quickly, loosely tent the pan with aluminum foil. (I usually add aluminum foil over the loaf around the 20 minute mark.) To test for doneness, if you gently tap on the loaf, it should sound hollow. For a more accurate test, the bread is done when an instant-read thermometer reads the center of the loaf as 195โ200ยฐF (90โ93ยฐC).
- Remove from the oven and allow bread to cool for a few minutes in the pan on a cooling rack before removing the bread from the pan and slicing. Feel free to let it cool completely before slicing, too.
- Cover leftover bread tightly and store at room temperature for 6 days or in the refrigerator for up to 10 days.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: Prepare recipe through step 6. Place shaped loaf in a greased 9×5-inch loaf pan or disposable loaf pan, cover tightly, and freeze for up to 3 months. On the day you serve it, let the loaf thaw and rise for about 4-5 hours at room temperature. Bake as directed. You can also freeze the baked bread loaf. Allow the bread to cool completely, then freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator or at room temperature, then reheat as desired.
- Overnight Instructions: Prepare the recipe through step 6. Cover the shaped bread tightly and refrigerate for up to about 15 hours. At least 3 hours before you need the bread the next day, removeย from the refrigerator, keep covered, and allow to rise on the counter for about 1-2 hours before baking. Alternatively, you can let the dough have its 1st rise in the refrigerator overnight. Cover the dough tightly and place in the refrigerator for up to 12 hours. Remove from the refrigerator and allow the dough to fully rise for 2 more hours. Continue with step 5.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Electric Stand Mixer or Large Glass Mixing Bowl with Wooden Spoon / Silicone Spatula | 9×5-inch Loaf Pan | Rolling Pin
- Yeast: Platinum Yeast from Red Star is an instant yeast. Any instant yeast works. You can use active dry yeast instead. Rise times will be slightly longer using active dry yeast. Reference my Baking with Yeast Guide for answers to common yeast FAQs.
- Flour: You can use all-purpose flour or bread flour. All-purpose flour is convenient for most, but bread flour produces a chewier loaf of bread and I highly recommend it. The bread is still soft no matter which you use. Either flour is fine and there are no other changes to the recipe if you use one or the other. I don’t recommend whole wheat flour because it doesnโt have the same baking properties as white flour or bread flour (the gluten levels are different). If you wish to use whole wheat flour, try my recipe for whole wheat bread instead.ย
- Doubling this recipe: For best results, I recommend making two separate batches of dough. However, if you want to double the recipe all in 1 mixing bowl, double all of the ingredients except for the yeast and butter. Use 3 and 1/4 teaspoons yeast and 6 Tablespoons of butter.
- Bread Machine Questions: I don’t own a bread machine so I have not tested it, but some readers in the comments section have had success.
- Adapted from Homemade Cinnamon Swirl Bread
Reader Comments and Reviews
Can I make this in a preheated Dutch oven instead of loaf pan?
Hi Sadie, This dough really needs the walls of a loaf pan to bake up properly. We havenโt personally tested it in a Dutch oven to be certain, but we fear it will be very flat. You might enjoy this artisan bread instead, which bakes wonderfully in a Dutch oven.
I have been making this bread for some time now and have probably already commented about how good and easy it is. But I am back in the comments to say how much faster and easier it is now that I have a scale and am following the grams listed for flour rather than measuring it out. As someone with memory issues who often loses track of things, I really appreciate that feature.
If I wanted to make this into a jalapeรฑo cheddar bread, how much cheese would you add?
Hi Helen, for that, we recommend using this recipe for cheese bread. Enjoy!
I love this recipe for one loaf. Do I just double the recipe for 2 loaves or do you have a different recipe.
Hi Faye! For best results, we recommend making two separate batches of dough. However, if you want to double the recipe all in 1 mixing bowl, double all of the ingredients except for the yeast and butter. Use 3 and 1/4 teaspoons yeast and 6 Tablespoons of butter.
I made this bread ,am now baking it every week, so easy ,soft and delicious no more store baked bread Thank you
Bless you sally! My family of 4 has requested this bread every single time and Iโll be making my 11th loaf today! Itโs so good. I have to up the flour to 450 grams and knead the mixer a bit longer to get the right texture. Such a consistent and delicious recipe, thank you girl!
I used a kitchen thermometer and scale to ensure correct temps and weights of the ingredients. I followed the ingredients and instructions to the letter, however my dough would not stop sticking to the bowl of my kitchen aid mixer. I added a little more flour after 5 minutes and it seemed to help a little, but then went right back to sticking again. I ran the mixer on low speed for 10 minutes total, then kicked it up to medium for an additional two minutes. The dough was still sticking, even after adding a bit more flour. I finally just removed it from the mixer and finished off by hand kneading, as I was worried about the dough becoming over-kneaded. Any ideas as to what the issue could be?
Hi Macy, There are a lot of variables that go into the consistency of dough, even down to the weather and humidity in the air. Thereโs nothing wrong with adding just a little more flour to bring the dough into a less sticky and knead-able consistency. We hope you enjoyed the finished bread!
Great beginner recipe! It still turned out wonderful despite my undoubtedly flawed kneading technique. I also didnโt have enough butter so I subbed about 1 tablespoon with vegetable oil. It was still fragrant and flavourful
Been making this every Sunday for the last couple of weeks and love it! I am vegan so I subbed Costco’s oatmilk for the whole milk and a vegan margarine for the butter and its turned out fantastic both times!
I am fascinated by how easy this was to make, and even more fascinated by how beautiful and delicious this was! Thank you for sharing.
I made this sandwich bread twice already in two weeks!! A hit in our home. Thank you so much for developing this recipe, Sally. We wonโt be eating grocery breads from now on. Yum!
I was using a bread recipe from another very respectable source, and after seven tries with different tweaks, it still wasn’t turning out well.
I used this recipe, and it came out perfectly the first time. I almost wept with relief!
It’s so soft, the flavour is incredible, and it baked flawlessly.
Thank you so much!
Hello! I have cut out refined sugar- can I use honey instead? If ya, what would the measurement be?
Hi Sara, you can use the same amount of honey instead of sugar without any changes. Let us know if you give it a try!
Hi! Love your recipes! Would you happen to know the nutritional values for the bread? Thank you!
Hi Holly, We donโt usually include nutrition information as it can vary between different brands of the same ingredients. Plus, many recipes have ingredient substitutions or optional ingredients listed. However, there are many handy online calculators where you can plug in and customize your exact ingredients/brands. Readers have found this one especially helpful: https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076
I just started making bread and today I made my very first sandwich bread using your recipe and it worked out perfectly exactly as it should and it tastes delicious. I’m definitely never buying bread again. Thank you!
My 3 year old and I loved making this bread. It turned out perfect!
Great recipe but my crust doesnโt get that nice dark brown like you have! Do you have any suggestions?
Thank you!
Hi Emily, it may just need a few more minutes in the oven.
Hello,
I haven’t made this yet but have used many of your recipes and love them. I am finding that most of the breads I make lately (not just yours) are way too salty for me. What is the least amount of salt that can be used in bread making? Also, can I use a cup of wheat flour in this recipe?
Thank you!
Hi Carol, many readers have reported success with swapping half of the flour for white whole wheat. We havenโt tested it ourselves, but it sounds like it should work. Let us know how it goes for you!
I loved how this tasted, but noticed the bottom was a little softer than normal. What could you recommend to help?
Hi Matthew, Are you making any substitutions? The rich dough, made with fat, creates that tighter, softer crumb. Make sure youโre using whole milk and softened butter.
I made this today, tastes amazing but my loaf deflated when I sliced it. Any tips where I went wrong?
My dough was very sticky after the first rise and I almost threw it in the bin but I decided to bake it anyways to see what happened. I wasnโt able to roll it, I just scraped it in!
Kids loved it xx
Hi Katie, Bread can deflate while cooling if itโs been under-baked. Could that be possible? Your oven may have hot/cool spots. Try rotating the loaves in the oven once during baking.
Wonderful bread recipe, I’ve made it 3 times in as many weeks, and can’t see myself going back to store bought bread at least for a while. It’s so good that I’ll find myself just snacking on plain slices. My cat also loves this bread, she will crawl all over me while I’m eating it and start licking and chewing on it which I’ve never seen her do with bread before.
Can I use this recipe in a Pullman pan?
Hi T! We have never tried using a pullman pan before. Many other readers have also reported using 9ร4 pullman pan with the lid off successfully, but we havenโt tried scaling this recipe for different sizes.
Did you make it in the pullman pan? This was the reason I came to the comments to see if anyone had made this wonderful bread recipe in the pullman pan.
First time making sandwich bread, and this recipe makes me feel like a pro! Never buying sandwich bread again! Thank you!!