This French Baguette recipe creates crisp, golden loaves with a chewy interior and that classic bakery-style crust. Made with just a handful of simple ingredients, the dough develops deep flavor through a long, slow rise, giving you that signature texture without complicated steps. It’s rustic, approachable, and perfect for everything from sandwiches to dipping in soups. Our homemade ciabatta bread is another fun choice for homemade bread.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
This recipe keeps things simple but delivers incredible results. The long fermentation builds flavor naturally, and the high-heat bake with steam gives you that crisp crust you expect from a traditional baguette. No special equipment needed.
Tips for Success
- The dough will be sticky, that’s exactly what you want.
- Let the dough rise long enough to develop flavor, don’t rush it.
- Use plenty of flour when shaping to keep it manageable.
- Steam in the oven is key for that crisp, crackly crust.
How to Serve
This baguette is incredibly versatile and works well for:
- Dipping into soups or stews, try it with our slow cooker beef stew
- Serving with butter or olive oil
- Making crostinis, and dipping into creamy spinach dip
Storage Tips
Store at room temperature in a paper bag for up to 2 days. For longer storage, freeze and reheat in the oven to restore the crust.
French Baguette
Ingredients
- 1 teaspoon rapid rise yeast
- 1½ cups water, room temperature
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt
- 4 cups all-purpose flour
Instructions
Dough
- In a large mixing bowl, combine yeast, water, and salt.
- Add flour and mix with a wooden spoon until fully incorporated. The dough will be sticky.
- Cover with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature for 12-20 hours, until bubbly.
- Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface. Dust the top with flour.
- Shape into a rectangle and cut into 4 equal pieces.
- Gently roll each piece into a loaf about 10 inches long and 1½ inches in diameter.
- Place on parchment-lined baking sheets that have been generously dusted with flour (2 loaves per pan).
- Dust tops with flour and cover loosely with plastic wrap.
- Let rise for 1-2 hours, until doubled.
Baking
- Adjust oven racks to middle and bottom positions.
- Preheat oven to 550°F (or as high as your oven allows).
- Place a 9×13-inch pan of water on the bottom rack to create steam.
- Score each loaf with 3-4 angled slashes.
- Lightly spritz loaves with water and place in oven.
- Bake for 15 minutes, spritzing and rotating pans every 5 minutes. Loaves are done when dark golden brown and hollow sounding.
- Cool completely before serving.
This recipe was inspired by iambaker.net’s French Baguette
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