Buttermilk Dill Bread

Ingredients

• 390 grams bread flour
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 2 teaspoons instant yeast
• 1½ teaspoons table salt
• 9 ounces plus 1 tablespoon buttermilk divided
• ¼ cup minced fresh chives
• 3 tablespoons chopped fresh dill
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter melted

Instructions

1. Whisk flour, sugar, salt, and yeast together in the bowl of a stand mixer.
2. Whisk 9 ounces buttermilk, chives, dill, and melted butter in a large liquid measuring cup.
3. Using dough hook on low speed, slowly mix the buttermilk mixture into the flour mixture and mix until cohesive dough starts to form and no dry flour remains, about 2 minutes, scraping down bowl as needed. Increase speed to medium-low and knead until dough is smooth and elastic and cleans side of bowl but sticks to bottom, about 8 minutes. Transfer dough to counter and knead by hand to form smooth, round ball, about 30 seconds.
4. Place dough seam side down in large, lightly greased bowl or container, cover with plastic wrap, and let rise until doubled in volume, about 1½-2 hours.
5. Grease 8½” x 4½” loaf pan. Press down on dough to deflate, then transfer to counter (side of dough that was facing bowl should now be facing up). Press and stretch dough into 8” x 6” rectangle with long side parallel to counter edge. Roll away from you into firm cylinder, keeping roll taut. Pinch seam and place loaf in pan seam side down, lightly pressing dough into corners.
6. Cover loosely with greased plastic and let rise until dough reaches 1 inch above the lip of the pan and dough springs back minimally when poked with a finger, about 1-1½ hours.
7. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 350°F. Gently brush loaf with remaining 1 tablespoon buttermilk. Bake until golden brown and loaf registers at least 205ºF internally, 35-40 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking. Let loaf cool in pan 15 minutes, then turn out onto cooling rack and cool completely before slicing.

Notes

31 October 2025: I made this bread for the third time today. We like it so much! Like last time, I added all three heaping tablespoons of chopped dill into the dough, along with a full ¼ cup of chopped chives. The first rise took 1 hour, 30 minutes in the oven with the light on. The second rise took 57 minutes on the counter (it was colder in the house today than the last two times I made the bread). As usual, I baked it for 20 minutes, rotated the loaf, and baked for another 19 minutes. I let it cool in the pan on the rack for 15 minutes before turning the loaf out of the pan.