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Classic Submarine Sandwich Rolls
While I love a crunchy-crust bread, that doesn’t stop me from also loving squishy soft bread, the kind a grocery store or Subway might call “French bread” but which only resembles the baguette in general shape. While this bread may seem misnamed to a French person, it’s lovely in many ways nonethless. Super-soft French bread is great for making subs, grinders, or hoagies — whatever your regional name is for long, fully-packed sandwiches. You can build the sandwich tall and yet squeeze it small enough to take a bite. Nothing squirts out the sides, and the roof of your mouth isn’t scraped by a rough crust. All that and the bread reinflates too.
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12″ long sub
The recipe is written for yeast leavening, and “white” flour, and it uses very basic kitchen equipment. It’s perfect for beginners who are eager to bake fresh bread with quality ingredients and advanced bakers who want classic sub sandwich bread. A stand mixer makes gluten development easier on the arms but it’s not required.
If you want to try the recipe with sourdough leavening instead of yeast, this FAQ explains How to convert recipes between sourdough and yeast. (Be aware that it can be challenging to get the same kind of crust browning you see in the images here with sourdough leavening. It’s not impossible but you may need to include some tricks.)
The recipe uses a 50:50 mix of all purpose (AP) and bread flour to get an ideal balance of chew and tenderness, but it is fine to use all of one or the other for convenience. For all AP flour, reduce the water by 20-30 grams; and for all bread flour, increase the water by 20-30 grams. Also, if your bread flour has less protein than Breadtopia’s 13.5%, use a bit less water or change the ratio of the flours in favor of bread flour e.g. to 30:70. You can modify the flour types in other ways as well. For example, use some whole wheat flour (additional water) for more interesting flavor. For more, check out our Bread Baking and Flour Substitution Tips.
Same dough weight, 12- and 8-inches long.
The recipe is written for two 12-inch French breads, but you can divide the dough however you prefer and shape the dough narrower or wider as depicted above. The bread is baked on a baking sheet at a relatively low temperature of 375°F to help ensure a soft crust. Steam is created via ice cubes on a tray under the baking sheet.
In the first test bake of this recipe, I let the dough proof until it was quite inflated, so it baked a bit flat and the scoring didn’t open much. For the second test bake, I proofed the dough less, but the scoring seemed to seal prematurely and the breads split open on their sides instead. Perhaps the low oven temperature and low volume of steam contributed to this, but rather than tinker with temperature, baking surface, or steam setup, for the next bake, I re-scored the dough after 5-6 minutes of baking. This was relatively easy to do because the dough is on a flat baking sheet. I ran the lame blade about 1/4″ deep on one side of each cut (see the photo gallery after the recipe). This allows the dough to continue expanding upward. If you’d like to read more on scoring twice, check out this Experiment Scoring Dough Once Versus Twice.
Two-phase scoring
Check out the photo gallery and shaping videos after the recipe.
Classic Submarine Sandwich Rolls
Make homemade super soft French bread for sandwiches using this beginner-friendly recipe. If you need more than two rolls, the recipe can easily be doubled and / or shaped in different ways and it freezes well too.
Ingredients
Instructions
Photo Gallery
Shopping List
High Protein Bread Flour
All Purpose Flour
Breadtopia’s Choice Kitchen Scale
$18.00Stainless Steel Measuring Cups
$16.95Magnetic Measuring Spoons
$17.00USA Pan Half Sheet Pan
$23.00Parchment Paper Sheets — 200 Sheets
$19.00Bread Lame
Classic Submarine Sandwich Rolls