There's a youtube channel called Chain Baker who does a good, if technical, job of explaining the bread-making process.

1. you can use starter, fresh yeast, or active dry... just start your yeast before using so you know it's still active.
2. flour protein content is important. Here, AP flour is "hard" and is fine for bread, but a lot of countries have softer wheat. If so, don't spend extra on "bread flour", just get some "gluten flour" to reinforce your flour, a tablespoon or so is sufficient.
3. you don't need sugar.
4. don't let your yeast and salt meet. At high concentrations, salt kills yeast, I just mix the salt in first.
5. you don't need a full second rise, but you do need to rest the dough before kneading (hydration helps form the gluten)

Oh, and atta flour is amazing. It's a whole wheat flour, but is as fine as regular flour, so you can get a very good "white" sandwich loaf that's whole wheat. Also tasty. I use half atta/half AP.

If you aren't sure if your bread is kneaded enough, check for "windowing". Stretch your dough as thin as possible... can you see light through it before it breaks? that's the window,

I have a family recipe for Everlasting Yeast Bread, the kind where you keep a starter in the fridge kind of like a pet. I make my own bread using the starter, a small amount of instant mashed potatoes, flour, water, salt, and sugar. It's not complicated, IMO, and it's one of those things where you can do other things as long as you come back every hour during the rise period to punch it down. It's generally the only bread I eat.

I make my own pizza dough, does that count? I use a 3-day poolish (a pre-ferment made of water, flour and yeast) to add to my pizza dough for an extra yeastie flavor. Unfortunately, I’ve spoiled myself, and now all franchise take-out pizza tastes like cardboard to me.

For crusty artisan loaves, the no-knead bread from the New York Times / Mark Bittman / Ed Lahey - it’s been circulating for nearly 20 years and it has evolved a little but basically remains the same. Or, for a whole-grain sourdough version, the book Bittman Bread.

For a mostly whole-wheat sandwich loaf, Just Bread.

I wish. I tried to do the whole sourdough starter thing a couple years ago, but it kept growing mold and I gave up.

I make a couple of pretty simple flat breads sometimes for company. You still have to let the dough rise, but they are quite forgiving and not fussy - good beginner recipes.

I make mine in my circa 1982 Cuisinart. It's very heavy and is made in Japan.

Put the liquid ingredients in, and then the flour. Run it until the dough makes a ball and rolls around the shaft. Take it out and do your usual. I don't need a bread machine at all. It's an alternative.

I recommend subscribing to America’s Test Kitchen. They do so much work testing and creating recipes, figuring out what is actually important for flavor etc while jettisoning techniques that don’t benefit enough, and explaining what to do and why. They’ve come up with some serious hacks to get good flavors and textures reliably and quickly (preferment, tangzhong, vodka in pie crust, easier croissants). Instead of doing loads of research you can just rely on them. Often there are videos to go with recipes which really helps with baking because I need to see what things are supposed to look like at various stages.

It probably won’t matter much for most easy breads, but be mindful of your elevation! I used to love making bread when I was home, but now I’ve moved to a place that is about 115 feet higher in elevation and haven’t been able to make a good bread since. I am vegan and gluten free (not by choice) and the ingredients are just too expensive to keep trying over and over. It’s like I’m cursed.

Lots of good tips in this thread! Once you get the hang of it you’ll be baking nonstop. I think the hardest part is exercising patience and not digging into the bread the moment it comes out of the oven hahaha.

Yes! I mostly do a simple one in my dutch oven (it’s just flour, yeast, salt, warm water) but I want to branch out more

I started baking my own bread right before covid, when everyone else started making their own bread.

You don’t need anything fancy. You don’t even need to use bread flour. All-purpose is great. Just some fresh yeast, and I’ve found honey works better than white sugar when proofing your yeast.

Just practice and enjoy!

Yes, with a bread maker 😎 makes it very easy and I make pizza dough in there too

I like this easy no-knead bread recipe! It’s very simple

I don't know what to answer because I only make shitty naan bread lol I found a recipe that is unauthentic but it's quick and it actually tastes very good for the little effort involved

Since it goes in the pan instead of the oven I'm going to say "no" because it technically isn't baking 😅

I do the Asian equivalent and cook my own rice 😂.

I always wanted an oven to bake! Maybe I'll make bread as my first recipe!