Basic Bread - for bread machines

When I was surfing for a basic white bread recipe using the breadmachine, I found one using plain flour and oats in allrecipes.com. There were so much rave about it so I decided to try it. However, I always get a sunken top. I like the bread as it's soft and most importantly, the ingredients used are very basic and I always have them in my kitchen cabinet. I have no idea what went wrong. Tried trouble-shooting to no avail.

A forum member, Laramie, shared her basic white loaf bread with us in M4M. I tried it and it has been my regular recipe if I'm lazy to do fanciful breads.


I do not know if you have the same problem as me but the crust of bread baked in a bread machine is too thick and I always end up slicing them away to feed the dog. Since DD3 is older now, I can put her on the highchair/exersaucer while I shape the bread dough and have the breads baked in the oven.

I've seek her permission to post her recipe in my blog (thanks Lara, if you're reading my blog).

Ingredients
1 cup cold water
3 cups bread flour (you can vary the ratio 1 cup plain: 2 cups bread flour if you wish)
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt (salt and sugar at opposite sides of the pan)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp yeast (make a hole in the centre & put in the middle of the flour)

Method
Place ingredients in the pan of the bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer. Select Basic Bread cycle; press Start.