Thanks guys for posting that - I was just going to say: starting from square one, it’s quite a lot to learn.
I mentioned before I think, but I highly recommend buying Bread Bakers Apprentice and reading all the intro material before staring on a recipe.
You may need to purchase some equipment such as a scale or 2 and a mixer.
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Thank you for sharing the video, that is really helpful. Seems like a long process but the rewards looks delicious!
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Hi there, I’ve been making breadmaker bread every 3 days for about 6 years now. Every breadmaker is different, you need to tweek each recipie until you get it right. My mother-in-law makes amazing bread in her breadmaker, but when I tried the exact same recipie in my new breadmaker it was a total flop! I had to change quite a few things to get a loaf like hers. I’ve made some good loaves, and some REALLY BAD loaves… Sounds to me that your problem is that your dough is too soft. There are lots of reasons for this. Different types of flour, different measuring techniques, ext… I read somewhere to properly measure flour you need to scoop it and then drop it into your measuring cup, and measure what falls… I’ve never seen or heard of anyone doing that, sounded like a “Pinterest know it all” to me. Anyway, I would suggest adding a couple tablespoons more of flour, OR a touch less water. Try one or the other, and only make one change at a time until you figure out what works for you. Another thing you could try is more salt in your recipie. Salt slows down the yeast action. I’ve found it helpful to keep notes of my changes until I get it just how I want it. Good luck, and have fun experimenting!
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Hey Ruben, I think a great place to start is at King Arthur Flour. I tell all new bakers to start here and look over their recipes, search for ones with 4 to 5 ingredients and that don’t look to complicated to start.
https://www.kingarthurflour.com
KAF is just a wealth of information on all things baking! They have short videos where they walk you through step by step how to bake bread. If you click on “LEARN”, the third tab over from the left at the top of the page, then scroll down a bit and click on “WATCH NOW” under the tab WATCH AND LEARN, you will see a whole list of videos, broken out into small increments of the baking process.
Some of their recipes were also featured on their blog, so there are more pictures and more step by step instructions.
Here is a link to a VERY simple easy hearth or French type bread.
And this link is for the same recipe, but with more pictures and tips:
https://www.kingarthurflour.com/learn/guides/yeast-baking
You might find these helpful:
https://www.kingarthurflour.com/videos/baking-skills/how-to-tell-if-bread-dough-is-fully-kneaded
https://www.kingarthurflour.com/videos/baking-skills/how-to-shape-a-sandwich-loaf
https://www.kingarthurflour.com/videos/baking-skills/how-to-shape-a-baguette
https://www.kingarthurflour.com/videos/baking-skills/how-to-slash-a-baguette
Read through the recipe I linked first and ask us some questions if you have any. There are so many experienced bakers on this forum, we can walk you through it!
If you start simple with a lean bread like this one, you won’t have to buy any specialty ingredients. If you don’t buy bread flour, but purchase all purpose (AP) flour instead, then just realize you may have to reduce the amount of water by 2 Tbs. Bread flour has a higher protein than AP, and will absorb more water. I do recommend KAF flour. It is really good stuff, very consistent.
In my opinion, you probably shouldn’t jump in to bread baking with sourdough or rolled and filled bread, or even one with a lot of nuts, seeds, or whole grains as these can take a little more experience to learn how to work with. Start simple until you are confident and are happy with your results. Practice, practice, and Post pictures!!!
I apologize for all of the links, rather than typing out a recipe and explaining it to you. I think the pictures and descriptions are done far better at KAF than I could do if I tried to explain and show pictures of the process.
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Everyone is posting their successes, but here is a fail. At the end of May I made a couple good loaves with a mix of sourdough starter and a reduced amount of instant dried yeast for leavening (about 1/2 tsp per 2 kg dough). We had a cold stretch in the beginning of June and in addition to the cold I neglected my starter. I pushed through and made a couple loaves anyways and I go two of these monstrosities. Gummy and pretty close to zero oven spring.
It has been a few weeks and my starter is revived again and I’m planning on giving the A/C a workout this weekend and trying again.
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It just so happens that today I spent the afternoon teaching the daughter of a friend of mine how to bake breads! She is a young teenager, and did a fabulous job for her first foray into baking yeasted breads!!
We did the KAF recipe I linked above, “The Easiest Loaf of Bread You’ll Ever Bake”
The loaf in the back is dusted with flour, as per the instructions. The loaf in front was brushed with an egg wash and sprinkled with oregano and parsley.
We did KAF’s Back of the Bag Oatmeal Bread.
To fill the time while bread dough was rising and baking, I showed her how to make a simple sweet pizza dough, which we turned into Sour Cherry dessert pizza, shown on the right.
And Apple Cinnamon dessert pizza.
Then to finish up the afternoon we used that same pizza dough recipe with minor changes to make it savory, rather than sweet. And out of the oven came supper!
It was a great day. God has gifted me with experience and knowledge in baking, and I was very blessed to be able to share that with this wonderful family. Teaching the next generation to cook and bake is precious!
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I buy sourdough from the local bakery here in town for $4 a loaf…excellent stuff but you never know if they’ll have it in or not. I refuse to turn the oven on in this heat…I should wheel my stove out to the driveway 
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Hot Cross Buns!
Not a lot to look at but they taste great! So much lemon/orange zest that they have a golden hue.
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Such a wonderful way to spend a day! Kudos for sharing your gift.
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@KSprairie Thank you so much for all the information you have giving me and for sharing the KAF link and explaining about the videos! for the tips and for all the recipe links. ( don’t apologize, the more information I can gather, the better )
Thank you for taking your time to help me out.
Ruben
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How do you do the brushed egg?
What a lucky girl and family by having you going to bake and to teach how to! Awesome! Too bad I don’t live closer 
Thanks for posting all this goodies!
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Doing an egg wash is super simple. There are slight variations but basically just beat an egg and use a kitchen brush to brush a light layer of the beaten egg over the bread right before you put it into the oven.
This will give the bread a glossy sheen and also contribute some to a darker color.
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Thanks for the explanation! I just get confused sometimes when some people only use the yolk and others use only the white and others used both for some recipes.
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Exactly - those are the variations I alluded to.
Most often I just use the whole egg beaten.
Seems the yolk-only produces much darker color and more of an eggy flavor in the finished product.
I think the white-only will give you mostly shine and little flavor.
Some recipes have you adding a dash of cream to the yolk-only wash. that would probably darken even more.
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Ruben,
as @TrilobaTracker has said an egg wash can be made of just the yolk, just the whites, or the whole egg, with or without added liquid! What I did for this wash was use one whole egg, beaten lightly with a fork until the egg is homogeneous looking. Then add in 1 Tbs of water, beat lightly again with the fork. I use a silicone pastry brush to GENTLY brush the egg wash across the bread loaf.
It doesn’t take very much of the mixture so I always have a lot left over. I pour it into a small freezer safe jar and freeze it. The next time I am baking I take out the jar and let it defrost on the counter for an hour or so while the bread is rising, then give it a quick stir and it’s ready to use for the next loaf or loaves of bread. I can reuse the same egg wash 3 to 4 times. I like being frugal and hate wasting an egg!
So if you only use the egg whites, that will give you are really nice shiny, almost “cracklely” type crust. That is very nice on something like a crusty European hard roll.
The egg wash makes the loaf brown nicely, as you can see. But you will have to watch it closely, and will probably need to “tent your loaf” for the last 10 to 15 minutes of baking. To do this, take a piece of tin foil that is slightly longer than the length of your loaf, crease it down the center lengthwise, and gently place it shiny side out over the loaf, in effect, “tenting” it. This will keep your loaf from over-browning.
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Thank you so much and for the well detailed information. So much appreciated!
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Great idea for saving the egg wash! I’ve never done that but always hated wasting it. Sometimes I’ll scramble it and eat it but I will try freezing it.
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Thanks for all the great tips. I’m almost due to make another loaf so I’ll experiment.
Quick update;
Made a new loaf yesterday, and it was much, much, better. Still collapsed a bit but recovered by the time it finished baking. The only difference was I used bread flour this time, instead of all purpose.
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