Wholemeal breads benefit tremendously: wholemeal flour tends to produce lower volume bread because the bran particles interfere with the gluten network, making it weaker and more susceptible to collapse. Freebake improver solves this problem by strengthening the gluten which promotes better gas retention.

The photograph below show the effect of using bread improver at 10% of flour weight:

Freebake White

Loaf pictured left is with Freebake Improver added Loaf pictured right is Standard Bake

1) Recipe

You will need: a 2lb/1kg loaf tin, greased or non-stick, and flour for dusting.

	White Bread		Wholemeal Bread
Boiling water:	45ml/g	1½ fl oz	50ml/g	1¾ fl oz
Cold water:	200ml/g	7 lf oz	225ml/g	8 fl oz
Vegetable oil:	25ml/20g	1 fl oz	20ml/g	1 fl oz
Salt:	6g	½ tsp	6g	½ tsp
Freebake Strong Flour:	390g	14 oz	390g	14 oz
Freebake bread improver:	40g	1½ oz	40g	1½ oz
Freebake dried yeast:	5g sachet		5g sachet

Weigh the ingredients, in the order above, into a mixing bowl or food mixer. Mix to combine all the ingredients.

2) Dough mixing

Hand kneading: Knead the dough by hand on a floured surface for about 10 minutes, until it becomes smooth and elastic, re-flouring the surface as necessary to prevent sticking.

Food mixers: We test our doughs on KitchenAid and Kenwood high quality, robust food mixers. Use the dough hook and mix as follows:

For Strong White Flour:
KitchenAid:	Slow speed: 2 mins
	Stop mixer and scrape down sides of bowl
	Speed 2: 8 mins
Kenwood:	Slow speed: 2 mins
	Stop mixer and scrape down sides of bowl
	Speed 1: 5 mins
For Strong Wholemeal Flour
KitchenAid:	Slow speed: 2 mins
	Stop mixer and scrape down sides of bowl
	Speed 2: 4 mins
Kenwood:	Slow speed: 2 mins
	Stop mixer and scrape down sides of bowl
	Speed 1: 5 mins

Depending on ambient temperature and humidity, it may be necessary to add a little more water or flour to get the dough into the best consistency: it should end up smooth and elastic.

3) Moulding and proving

Allow the dough to rest, covered with a damp cloth or plastic bag, for about 15 minutes. Then, mould  the dough, place it in a bread tin or on a baking sheet, and prove until it has approximately doubled in size. For details on how to do this, see our “Moulding and proving by hand” section.

4) Baking

Carefully place the dough in a preheated oven at 230C/450F (Fan assisted 210C/410F), Gas mark 8.
Immediately reduce the temperature to 210C/410F/Gas Mark 7 (Fan assisted 200C/400F) and bake tin bread for 30 minutes or rolls for 15-20 minutes, until golden brown.

If using a Freebake flexible silicon baking tin increase the bake time by 5 minutes.

You can check if the bread is baked by removing from the tin, and tapping the bottom of the bread. If it sounds hollow, the bread is properly baked. If not, put it back in the tin and bake for a few more minutes.

When baked, remove from tin and allow to cool on a wire rack.

In general, longer programmes result in breads with more open, irregular texture and possible collapse. Vegetable oil in the recipe will produce bread higher in volume but softer and less easy to slice.

If the volume of the bread is too large and the texture too soft you can reduce the quantity of water slightly, making sure that the dough is not too stiff for the mixer to handle.

We have tested a wide range of machines and programmes and our recommendations for producing good volume, excellent flavour bread are shown in the table below.

Bread improver will increase the loaf height, so it is important to adjust the mix weight as shown.

Make sure the mixing blade is fitted and place the mixing pan onto an accurate weighing scale. Weigh the ingredients into the pan in the following order:

1. Boiling water
2. Cold water
3. Vegetable oil
4. Salt
5. Strong flour
6. Bread improver
7. Freebake dried yeast

Select the appropriate programme and start the machine. After 1or 2 minutes use a plastic or wooden spatula to carefully scrape any flour clinging to the sides of the mixing pan into the mix.

At the end of the programme, remove the bread from the tin immediately, and allow to cool on a rack for at least 1 hour before slicing.

White Breads:

Machine/ programme	Vegetable Oil	Boiling water	Cold Water	Salt	Freebake Strong  White Flour	Freebake Bread Improver	Freebake Dried yeast
Kenwood BM200
2 Basic large	20ml/16g 1½ tbs	40ml/g 1½ fl oz	176ml/g 6 fl oz	5g ½tsp	310g 11oz	34g 1¼ oz	5g sachet
Panasonic 206/251/252/253/254/255
Bake rapid Dark, XL or L	20ml/16g 1½ tbs	50ml/g 1¾ fl oz	230ml/g 8 fl oz	6g ½tsp	390g 14oz	40g 1½ oz	5g sachet
Bellini BEBM20
1 Basic, Dark	20ml/16g 1½ tbs	50ml/g 1¾ fl oz	230ml/g 8 fl oz	6g ½tsp	390g 14 oz	40g 1½ oz	5g sachet
Morphy Richards 48245
1 Basic, Light, small	16ml/13g 1tbs	34ml/g 1¼ fl ox	165ml/g 5½ fl oz	5g ½tsp	270g 9½ oz	30g 1 oz	5g sachet
Breville BR9
2 White rapid, dark, 750g	20ml/16g 1½ tbs	42ml/g 1½ fl oz	192ml/g 6¾ fl oz	5g ½tsp	324g 11½ oz	36g 1¼ oz	5g sachet

Wholemeal Breads:

Machine/ programme	Vegetable Oil	Boiling water	Cold Water	Salt	Freebake Strong  Wholemeal Flour	Freebake Bread Improver	Freebake Dried yeast
Kenwood BM200
2 Basic large	22ml/18g 1½ tbs	48ml/g 1¾ fl oz	208ml/g 7¼ Fl oz	5g ½tsp	310g 11 oz	34g 1¼ oz	5g sachet
Panasonic 206/251/252/253/254/255
Bake rapid Dark, XL or L	25ml/20g 1¾ tbs	60ml/g 2 fl oz	260ml/g 9 fl oz	6g ½tsp	390g 14 oz	40g 1½ oz	5g sachet
Bellini BEBM20
1 Basic, Medium	25ml/20g 1¾ tbs	60ml/g 2 fl oz	260ml/g 9 fl oz	6g ½tsp	390g 14 oz	40g 1½ oz	5g sachet
Morphy Richards 48245
1 Basic, Light, small	18ml/14g 1¼ tbs	40ml/g 1½ fl oz	190ml/g 6½ fl oz	4g ½tsp	270g 9½ oz	30g 1 oz	5g sachet
Breville BR9
2 White rapid, dark, 750g	20ml/16g 1½ tbs	50ml/g	220ml/g	5g ½tsp	328g 11½ oz	36g 1¼ oz	5g sachet

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