I have always wanted one of these, but: :: are they a nine-day wonder, and after you've eaten your fill of butter-drenched hot bread it will just gather dust in the kitchen corner before making its way to the Cats Protection League shop? :: or are they absolutely life-changing, so much so that Tesco will go bankrupt after you refuse to buy another half-stale pre-baked loaf in favour of your own mouth-watering kitchen creation? Advice please!
pretty much everyone i know who has bought one... bought one expecting B and ended up with A... if you're gonna make your own bread, just use you hands/mixer [if you have one and can be arsed to clean it afterwards] and your oven...
We use one quite a lot when at home, easy to use a packet mix + leave it timed overnight so it finishes in time for breakfast in the morning and it is way nicer than normal bread especially when straight out the machine.
Fair question. I'm guessing - and could be wrong - that a machine is a bit quicker and easier than doing it the proper way. I suppose I'm a bit "quick fix" in the krtchen, prefering to make Nespresso coffee over filtered or percolated for example.
[Forum grammar police] Nespresso can not, will not and has never been considered coffee. Your sentence is invalid. [/Forum grammar police] Bake your own bread, bread makers make wierd bread :-/
I'm a massive fan of the bread machine - have had one for a couple years (Panasonic SD-255, which I'd massively recommend, make sure you get one with a "bits" dispenser if you're buying) and it has never gathered dust. 5 minutes chucking ingredients in before bed = waking up to a fresh loaf. I avoid buying loaves from shops whenever possible. Can't say I've ever had 'weird' bread from the machine either. Those of you suggesting "just make your own" clearly have too much time on your hands!
We use one here and make 90% plus of our bread in it. It's generally speaking a lot nicer than supermarket bought bread, works out cheaper and takes no more than 5 minutes to prep. In answer to your immediate question, it's entirely dependent on you.
We used to have one when I was younger, the bread tasted different, but in a good way. We are conditioned to accept the rubbish churned out in the shops. Personally I'd give out a try they do more than just bread, donuts are good too.
It only take 2 or 3 minutes with practise to measure out flour,yeast,water and a pinch of salt and then tap the right buttons. You can buy quite a few different flours for various different bread so dead easy.
We have a Tesco branded one here and used it a few times but whenever we* made bread it just collapsed although the bread was nice, and waking up to that smell in the morning! Incidentally it also makes great dough for doughnuts and pizza * for "we" read "my girlfriend"
We have one that's a crap baker, but it's so easy to make dough and then prove/bake it off yourself, it's a brilliant bit of kit.
We've had one for a few years, when we were using a lot of bread it was awesome, I much prefer the "home made" bread from store bought stuff, however now it's just mum and myself at home we don't use any where near as much bread and so it tends to go mouldy quickly as it's not getting used (it doesn't have any preservatives in it like shop bought stuff). I will however say that there is still a skill to using one, if mum or I set the machine up then the bread was very nice, if my little bro set it up, the bread was heavy and like concrete but we never worked out how he did it Infact reading this thread has just made me really want some fresh baked bread, think i'll get some flour etc tomorrow and bake some
I never understood the appeal. It only takes about 10 minutes to mix dough and knead, throw in a bowl to rise for couple hours and toss in the oven for 20 minutes. If it seems complex, start with the easy recipes like French Peasant. Also it seems to me that in most cases the premixed packets are at least as expensive as ready to eat bread from the supermarket, so there really is even less point to me. If you are still mixing your own dough then the maker is an unnecessary gadget as an oven is likely to do a better job, especially if you like crusty bread.
Bread machines make awesome bread. Fills the house with a gorgeous smell when it's almost ready, and the stuff itself makes the *BEST* toast.
Bread makers are damn awesome! As others have said, you can set a timer so that bread can be produced overnight for breakfast and the taste of the bread is so much better than off the shelf stuff. Years ago, my mother used to make me chocolate bread using one, which involved chucking in chocolate spread and chocolate drops - mmm, tasty!
Having been making bread by hand for well over a year now, and learnt quite a lot about the artisan process and commercial one, all I can say is bread makers are devil machines. All they do is shrink the commercial process and stick it in your home. There is absolutely no point buying a bread maker thinking you will be better off nutritionally or otherwise with one over supermarket loaves. I'd say the only reason it does taste a bit better is the quality of ingredients used is higher in most cases. What breadmakers do, is recreate the thing known as the "chorleywood process", which is a fast rising bread process that eliminates some fairly important parts of breadmaking, and increasing the yeast required massively. The main thing is what happens to the glutenin in the flour (or more saliently, what doesn't happen, I suppose), in that it doesn't get converted very well to gluten and actually becomes quite hard to digest. There is a theory that is becoming more and more accepted that the chorleywood process is pretty much solely responsible for the huge increase in coeliac and IBS cases over the last 35 to 40 years, seeing as some 90% of bread consumed in the UK is now chorleywood. Even the "fresh" bread from the bakery aisle is indeed chorleywood. In short, please, please do not buy a bread maker. They are devil machines and only serve to prolong the decline of one of the best aspects of cooking out there. If you want to learn how to make bread properly, I really cannot highly recommend a chap called Dan Lepard enough. Some of his work has taught me how kneading for 10 to 15 minutes is total myth and isn't required at all, and most loaves are better off without it. You can also learn that dding 7 grams of yeast to a 500 gram loaf is a biggest load of horseshit you'll ever hear. 1 to 2 grams is quite enough and if you are willing to be patient, .5grams is also enough. A good place to get started are these recipes from Dan Lepard: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/oct/02/sour-cream-sandwich-bread-recipe http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/feb/06/cider-rye-loaf-baking-lepard if you are feeling really really adverturous, I would highly recommend learning the art of sourdough made using wild yeast. It's life changingly good but the dough is very difficult to handle so maybe don't start with this! http://www.azeliaskitchen.net/blog/dan-lepard-white-sourdough/ Thanks for listening - hopefully one or two people I've converted away from bread makers... If anyone wants specific advice on making bread please PM me, I'm literally so more than happy to help others get baking. edit: And before anyone says I have too much time on my hands - yes at first it took some time to get things down but now I have had a good bit of practice, I can have a loaf ready to rise using under 5 minutes of my time. Spread out over 20 or so I admit, but my actual interaction with the loaf from start to finish would be well under 20 minutes. The rest of the time I spend doing other things. If you can learn the art of reducing yeast, y'all will be able to make a loaf that rises while you are at working and ready to go in the oven when you get home (or while you sleep/in oven when you awake).
