Here is a list of essential baking ingredients that you need to make great tasting homemade bread, banana bread, muffins, etc. Keep these ingredients as a permanent part of your pantry. This will allow you to quickly make a wide array of tasty homemade breads & sweet quick breads in order to feed your hungry family. If you are looking for packaged ingredient kits, please visit Bread Dad’s bread mixes page.
Bread Machine Yeast
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Basic Pantry Items – These are some of the most essential baking & bread making ingredients that you should always keep in your pantry. For many more essentials, see the ingredient lists below this section.
- Flour – All purpose flour, bread flour, gluten free flour, whole wheat flour, etc.
- Salt – Sea salt, kosher salt, etc.
- Sugar – Brown sugar, white sugar, confectionary sugar, etc.
- Yeast – Bread machine yeast, instant yeast, active dry yeast, etc.
- Chocolate Chips – Essential ingredient for many desserts & cookies.
Leavening Agents (i.e. Yeast & Baking Powder) – You should consider using FRESH leavening agents for all of your recipes. Old/stale ingredients (i.e. yeast or baking soda) can prevent your breads & banana breads from rising properly.
- Baking Powder – We try to use aluminum free baking powder in our recipes.
- Baking Soda – When making banana bread or cookies, you shouldn’t rely on the old baking soda that has been deodorizing your refrigerator for the past two years. You might not get optimal results. 🙂
- Active Dry Yeast – This yeast is often used for oven-baked breads. It is not a bread machine yeast.
- Bread Machine Yeast – New/active bread machine yeast is one of the the most essential bread machine ingredients!!! Dead yeast is not positive for bread making.
- Instant Yeast – This type of yeast does not have to be dissolved in a liquid before using.
- Sourdough Starter – This ingredient will help you to create delicious sourdough bread.
Flour & Related Ingredients – Flour is one of the most essential baking ingredients. Always keep extra flour in your pantry. Updated
- All-Purpose Flour – All-purpose flour is commonly used for used for cakes, cookies, etc.
- Almond Flour
- Bran – Bran is an easy way to add fiber & roughage to your bread.
- Bread Flour – Bread flour is usually the best flour to use for bread making.
- Buckwheat Flour
- Coconut Flour
- Cornmeal – You can’t make delicious sweet cornbread muffins without cornmeal!
- Flaxseed (Ground) – Ground flaxseed provides the extra fiber in our flaxseed bread.
- Gluten Free Flour – Our amazing gluten free chocolate chip banana bread uses gluten free flour.
- Multigrain Cereal – This cereal product is used for making multigrain bread.
- Organic Flour
- Potato Flour
- Rice Flour
- Rye Flour – Perfect for making rye bread sandwiches.
- Self Rising Flour – Self rising flour already contains baking powder.
- Whole Wheat Flour – Add some whole wheat fiber to your diet.
Oats & Oatmeal – Updated
- Old Fashion Oatmeal – This adds large oat “flakes” to bread recipes, etc . Oat flakes are used to make oatmeal banana bread, oatmeal bread, etc.
- One Minute Oatmeal
- Rolled Oats
- Steel Cut Oats
Sugar & Related Ingredients – Updated
- Brown Sugar – Light or dark brown sugar.
- Cane Sugar
- Coconut Sugar
- Confectioners Sugar – Powdered sugar
- Honey
- Molasses – People love or hate the flavor of molasses. We like it (in moderation) and molasses provides your bread with a great brown color.
- Monk Fruit Sugar
- Sanding Sugar – Different colored sugar. Used in baking.
- Turbinado Sugar – Large crystal brown sugar
- White Granulated Sugar – Probably the most used sugar in baking.
Salt – Updated
Fruit (Dried) – Dried fruit is used in many different recipes such as cranberry bread, golden raisin banana bread, chocolate chip cranberry cookies, etc. Updated
- Apples
- Apricots
- Banana Chips
- Blueberries
- Cherries
- Cranberries
- Dates
- Figs
- Golden Raisins
- Mangoes
- Oranges
- Pears
- Pineapples
- Prunes
- Raisins
- Strawberries
Chocolate & Related Ingredients – Chocolate is used in so many delicious recipes such as our M&M chocolate chip cookies, chocolate chip banana bread muffins or white chocolate chip cookies. Updated
- Baking Cocoa – Baking cocoa is often used to add a “chocolaty” color & flavor to cakes & cookies.
- Butterscotch Chips – Butterscotch chips are essential for recipes such as butterscotch banana bread, butterscotch chocolate chip cookies, etc.
- Caramel Chips
- Chocolate Chunks – Larger bits of chocolate.
- Dark Chocolate Chips
- Milk Chocolate Chips
- Mini Chocolate Chips – Smaller chocolate chips that we used to top our chocolate chip banana muffins.
- M&M®s
- Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips
- White Chocolate Chips
Milk & Related Ingredients
- Instant Milk – Instant milk powder is a good backup in case you run out of milk in the refrigerator… while making a recipe!! 🙂
- Buttermilk Powder – Make buttermilk at home with buttermilk powder. Great pantry item. Otherwise, you might have to run to the store to buy liquid buttermilk (and liquid buttermilk is often hard to find these days).
- Soy Milk Powder – A non-dairy alternative to cow’s milk.
Nuts & Related Ingredients
Oil (Vegetable)
Spices
- Allspice
- Black Pepper
- Chives – We grow our own chives in our backyard for a truly natural & organic ingredient. Of course, if you want the easy route, there are dried chives too. 🙂
- Cinnamon
- Garlic Powder
- Ginger – If there isn’t any ginger then there can’t be any gingerbread!!
- Italian Seasonings – This is an essential spice for Italian Herb Bread. It is a mix of spices such as oregano, sage, rosemary and thyme.
- Nutmeg
- Onion Powder
- Oregano
- Red Pepper Flakes – If you want to add a little zing to your bread.
- Rosemary – Rosemary is a very tasty herb used for making rosemary breads or Italian style breads.
- Spice Racks with Spices – Racks full of commonly used spices.
- Vanilla Extract – Vanilla extract is used in many recipes (such as banana breads and cookies).
- White Pepper
Bread Mixes – Packaged ingredient kits
- White Bread Mixes – Ingredient kits for Buttermilk White Bread, Country Farm White Bread, Potato White Bread, Sour Cream White Bread, etc.
- Wheat Bread Mixes – Ingredient kits for Honey Wheat Bread, Buttermilk Wheat Bread, Honey Oat Bread, Multigrain Bread, etc.
- European Style Bread Mixes – Ingredient kits for Pumpernickel, French Bread, Italian Country Bread, etc.
- Other Bread Mixes – Ingredient kits for popular breads such as San Francisco Sourdough Style Bread, Deli-Style Rye Bread and California Raisin Gourmet Bread.