Freezing Bread Dough

In my journey of bread baking I am always looking for ways to make my baking more efficient. As much as I LOVE baking homemade bread, I don't love how much time it takes. I used to bake two loaves of bread once a week and that required a good 3 hours of mixing, kneading, rising, kneading again, shaping, rising, and baking. Whoo!!

Then, I had the idea of designating one day for a mega-bread-baking day. I baked as much bread as time would allow and I froze it. That worked well but I did miss having freshly baked bread and I also used up an entire day. Don't get me wrong! I LOVED spending an entire day baking. It was very relaxing and therapeutic. I just need to get other things done around here too.

I have discovered something great!! Freezing Bread Dough. I've heard of people doing this and I know you can buy dough at the store but I've never done it myself. I tried it last week and it turned out great!

Here is what I did:

1. I pulled out my favorite bread recipe: Amish White Bread
2. I made the dough as always
3. I kneaded the bread until it was ready for the first rising (per the recipe)
4. However, instead I went ahead and shaped the dough into two loaves
5. I placed the loaves into my two well-greased bread pans
6. Covered the pans and dough with plastic wrap
7. Placed the covered pans into the freezer.
8. I waited until the dough was stiff and wrapped each loaf in plastic wrap.
9. I placed the two loaves into a gallon sized freezer bag and put immediately back into the freezer.
10. The dough is good for 3 months.

Today I made one loaf of the yummy bread. Here's how that went.

1. Around 7 am I pulled one frozen solid loaf of bread dough and placed it into the bread pan it fit into (I have one slightly bigger than the other). The bread pan is well greased.
2. I covered the pan and dough with plastic wrap that I sprayed with pan spray...spray side down.
3. I left the dough to thaw and rise at the same time.
4. Once the dough had risen thoroughly I placed the pan into the oven and baked according to the recipe. (Minus the plastic wrap, of course).

I really like this method because I can make one loaf at a time and it is fresh each time. Frozen dough also takes up less space in the freezer. My new goal is to maintain frozen dough in the freezer so that it is already ready for me to pull it out and bake away. Yum!! Can you smell it?

Freezing Bread Dough is what Works For Me!!