Our Very First Loaf

My wife and I, we're bread lovers. Yes we enjoy our bread very much.
We would buy about at least 2 loafs every week, if not 2 and 1/2. We'll use it for various things - either for sandwich or with butter and jam.
So we figured what better things to learn than to make your own bread. This we did. So we embarked on making our first loaf not very long ago and as you can see below is the picture of the end result.





It may not be much, but it tasted just like other breads we've bought out there.
To make your basic loaf like did, there are 4 key ingredients

1. Salt
2. Flour - we used all purpose white flour for now
   
3. Water (lukewarm)
4. Yeast

The steps are pretty simple too. You'll need to:

1. Mix your yeast with the water.
2. Then simply mix the salt and flour.
3. Then stir until you get a wet dough mixture.
   
4. Simply leave the dough covered for about 2 hours to allow it to rise.
5. Then, once it has risen, you'll need to knead the dough a little. Add flour (if necessary) to avoid it being sticky to your fingers.
6. Shape it according to whimps and fancy. Allow it to rest for another 1/2 hour.
   
7. Then simply cut any design of your liking at the top of the dough. The idea is to allow a crack for the dough to expand when baking it.
8. Once you've done that, simply place the dough onto a tray (with a parchment paper beneath it).
   
9. As for your oven, you should have already set it to pre-heat at 350F. Then place the tray into your over, whist you place a smaller tray with water below in the oven as well (to allow for moisture in the oven during the baking process).
10. Bake the bread for 40 minutes. Of course, check it from time to time to see if its ready as some oven may be hotter than others.