French Bread Dough Recipe

 

French Bread Dough Recipe

Here is my French bread dough recipe.  I’ve used this recipe for making loaves of bread, dinner rolls, and dough for calzones.  Enjoy.

French Bread

Dinner Rolls

Calzones

If you have suggestions for improvements, or additions please add them to the comment section of this post.

Ingredients for Dough:

1 1/2 cups warm water

1 1/4 Tablespoons sugar

1 1/4 Tablespoon Canola or Olive oil

3 1/2 cups of Flour

1 1/4 tablespoons of yeast

Dash of Italian Seasoning

Instructions:

In a small bowl, mix warm water, sugar, and yeast. The water should be slightly warm to touch (around 105 – 115 degrees).   Stir mixture and let sit for 5 to 15 minutes.  While yeast is activating with the sugar, a  layer of creamy bubbles should form, on the surface of the watery mixture. 

While yeast is proofing place the other ingredients, with the exception of the Italian seasoning, in a large mixing bowl.  Once yeast has proofed pour foamy, watery mixture into the mixing bowl.    

Mix everything together thoroughly.  This can be done by using your hands or a fork.  Fold the flour mixture into self, over and over again, until thoroughly mixed.

Mixed dough should be slightly tacky, but not so much that it sticks to your fingers or the bowl.  It should also not be too dry so the dough doesn’t stick together.  If it is too sticky, add a little more flour.  If too dry, add a little more water.   

Cover mixing bowl and dough with damp cloth.  This keeps it from drying out during the rising process.  Punch the dough down every 10 minutes, for an hour, then let the dough sit in bowl for an hour or so while the dough rises.   Keep it covered while rising.

After it has risen, punch down one last time.  Take dough out of bowl and shape into loaves, dinner rolls, or flat circles for making calzones.

If making loaves or rolls, place dough in a greased baking pan and let rise for another hour, still keeping it covered with a damp cloth. Once risen they are ready for final prep step.

If making calzones, roll the dough out into a circle, on a floured hard surface.  Once rolled out, place  desired filling on ½ of the circle of dough and then fold the other ½ of the dough over and pinch edges with a fork to seal filling inside.  

Final prep step before baking, is to brush oil over the top of the loaves, dinner rolls, or calzones, then sprinkle with Italian seasoning. 

Bake at 375 degrees until golden brown (should be around 25 to 35 minutes).

Let cool and serve.

This recipe makes 2 loaves, 8 – 10 dinner rolls or 4-6 calzones.  If you don’t want to use all the dough at one time, you can store unused dough in an air tight container in the refrigerator for a few days.