My Wife has decided to add to the junk pile under the sink with all the other gadjets .
She Bought a bread maker ;-((.
I told her this was a catastofic mistake and could finacialy cripple us .
After 4 attemps at the costliest bread in the world I am stumped ?
Can an edible loaf actualy be made from this …
I know it could be numerous factors flour etc .
Does anyone have a full Proof recipe ….even 1 edible roll would be something .
Please before the bird table is full of dead sparrows .
JIm

Please before the bird table is full of dead sparrows .

Lol 🙂

Panasonic ones are great.

Yup, but stick with the basic bread recipe for a while, and try just changing the amounts of salt, yeast and sugar you put in by small amounts, but keep track of what you've done,so you know what difference chages are making. It can vary from one machine to the next, what flour your'e using, allsorts really.

Then go for cinnamon raisin bread, timed bake so it's ready about three minutes before you need it, great smell to be woken up to 🙂

Seriously – buy some flour improver off Ebay – it makes a massive difference. One teaspoon per mix and your wifes baps will be superb.

My Mother-in-law used to make some lovely tasting breads in her bread-maker 🙂

My mum bought a really chaep one, made fab bread, broke after a few months, no longer made, put more money towards a 'better' one, made rubbish bread, took it back, paid out even more, made rubbish bread, gave up!

Couple of years later, original cheapy re-appeared in Tesco or somewhere, now even cheaper, still makes the best bread!!!! I'm sure it's only a matter of ingredients as previously mentioned, but it does make you laugh when the cheapest is the 'best'!

leave my wifes babs out of this she wont let me rub flower improver on them
jim

It's perfectly possible – my mum does it a lot.

Make good bread that is, not rub flour improver on her baps.

It's easily possible.

To start with get a pre-made mix, that you add water ( and sometimes butter ) to, and use that to get familiar with the machine.

When you can get reasonable bread from a mix, start making your own bread.

Yup, just set the timer on m machine so that i wake up to the smell of a perfect fresh loaf.

Here's my recipe:

Add the following ingredients to the machine mixing bowl in the following order:

· 350ml water
· 25g butter
· 250g Morrisons Strong wholemeal flour
· 250g Morrisons Strong white flour
· 1 and ¼ tsp of salt
· 4 tsp of sugar
· 2 tsp of yeast (make sure it isn’t in contact with the water / salt if you are not going to put the machine on straight away)

Optional extras

· 2 tbsp of Walnut pieces
· 2 tbsp of Sunflower seeds

Cooked on the 1kg loaf setting (500g and 750g are options on our machine) on the max browning crust setting.

Mmmmm. Roll on 0700 tomorrow morning.

thanks beamer
jim

cinmon raisen …bread ……………….gasp …
is it a secret recipe?
jim

god im hungry …

As far as I can tell, the most important thing is to add far too much salt, it does have an effect on how the bread rises but the saltier, the tastier. Purely a generalisation of course 😉

If I can make half-decent bread without using any actual flour, I'm sure you can.

It's a load of bloody alchemy.

You've got more chance of getting a blow job off Cheryl Cole than getting a decent loaf of bread from a 'breadmaker'.

The name Sodden sponge maker would have more fidelity with the actual product these contraptions turn out.

Our Morphy Richards breadmaker does make good pizza dough though….. in about seven times the time it takes to make it manualy 😉

Excellent bread every time. Follow the instructions. Simples.

We got one a few years ago, but found it made better adobe bricks and/or doorstops than bread–hopefully they have improved.

seeing the ghastly attempts that emerged from my parents (expensive) bread maker I've always made mine in the oven. TBH I can't say it's ever been difficult enough to make me think of buying a bread maker.

that said, my mother-in-law loves hers though primarily I think that's because theirs has a timer which means they wake up to a freshly made loaf for breakfast.

If you're doing it yourself then I'd recommend the Ballymaloe (sp?) cookbook on bread making.

Excellent bread every time. Follow the instructions. Simples.

+1

I had problems with wholemeal loaves, but it's because I was cutting back on the salt. If I follow the instructions, I get a perfect loaf every time. (I use a Panasonic BTW)

Follow the instructions. Make a loaf everyday with mine. At least it's real bread

We've not had any problems at all, apart from the odd occasion when I've been so pissed/tired that I've left the yeast or sugar out, and ended up with a brick or something. Bread can be tricky stuff, but I've found there's two easy steps that make it pretty much foolproof.

step 1 – buy a Panasonic breadmaker*
step 2 – follow the recipe exactly. It's chemistry.

Oh, and I can't believe it's expensive compared to shop bread, unless you're buying Tesco value bread normally.

You'll probably still be right if you didn't buy a Panasonic, but the weight of public opinion strongly suggests these are the best – ours has lasted 7 years of nearly daily use, making it our longest lasting kitchen appliance.

We've been using a Panasonic for years, not had a bad loaf. As above, follow the recipe exactly (as it's sort-of cooking, and everyone knows cooking is a black art).

Another vote for Panasonic, had ours for ages and had some very nice bread from it

Bun dough ain't too shabby either and the pizza dough is decent as well

Make good bread that is, not rub flour improver on her baps.

LOVL!!!

If you follow the instruction EXACTLY it will work ok. Experimentation and care and you can get better than that.

my only fail was marzipan and cherry loaf which was edible but distinctly strange.

I use a little vitamin C powder to improve the flour in my breadmaker in normal loaves

(Morphy Richards machine picked up off freecycle)

don't get me wrong but I find the most tedious part of making bread the weighing out, why use a machine to do the fun part? just get up an hour earlier and make it by hand?

My mum has a Panasonic one. White bread is OK, wholemeal/brown etc is much better.

The doughnuts however are AMAZING.

Bread makers are great, but they take a bit of getting used to. I agree that you should start with the simple stuff and work your way up. The manual usually come with some recipes to get you started. Keep at it though, they make really nice bread when you've cracked the perfect recipe!

another one for Panasonic.

if you're going to do it alot then get a big pack of yeast from the organic food shop – loads cheaper then those sachet things from the supermarket

I think the one we use is Fermipan red.

Whats up with your loaf?

not risen – no yeast / too much salt / not enough suger

our recipe is similar to binners but
· 350ml water
· 25g butter
· 1lb 2oz Bread flour (mixture of white/brown % each way depends on how brown I want it – up to 12oz brown – normally about 4oz brown)
· 1 tsp of salt
· 1 tsp of sugar
· 1 tsp of yeast (make sure it isn’t in contact with the water / salt if you are not going to put the machine on straight away)

I'm surprised anyone could manage to make bad bread, it's so simple. I'm also surprised at people putting butter in the mix – I prefer to spread mine on after it's cut 🙂

I've got the testco cheapie thing. So far i've only used it with the kit type packs that the supermarkets sell. Its been better than good to be honest!

Hang on hang on. It Beamers not Binners that suggested the recipie above.

(not sure what the connotations of that mix up might be.)

Our machine is a Kenwood BM 250 by the way.

Some good recipie ideas in Fresh Bread in the Morning.

my sister only seems to be able to make bricks in her bread maker… 😉

I like the idea of one. I am sure the notion of how good the bread will be will far outweigh the reality on most occasions though.

just get up an hour earlier and make it by hand?

You are taking the p*ss surely?

Got a cheapie out of Costco – great. Big plus, the timer so the house filled with the smell freshly baked bread in the morning. tried a variety of recipes and had very few failures.
Then it broke and I replaced it by going on ebay late one night and a bit too fullof booze for that to be clever. Insstead of a breadmaker I got a Kenwood Chef and numerous attachments, which was a bit of a surprise when it all turned up. Far better bread, but more work. And I make a lot of cakes now as well. And I can do rolls as well

I'm with MrNutt, had a breadmachine, was never particularly impressed with the bread, decided to have a go making it 'properly' and the results are amazing and so much better.

I reckon I can make a loaf, by hand, by expending about 10 minutes effort.

1. Measure out ingredients, after a while you can do this by eye. 2 mins
2. Put ingredients in bowl, add liquid while mixing with a fork. 2 mins
3. Kneed dough 1 min
4. Leave for 5 mins (make coffee)
5. Kneed dough for 1 min
6. Leave for 5 mins (read the paper)
7. Kneed dough and shape into a round 1 min
8. Leave for 30-60 mins to prove (wash car, clean bathrooms etc)
9. Knock back, kneed and shape into loaves 2 mins
10. Preheat oven (high as possible 15 mins or so)
11. Put in loaves, turn down heat to 200 then again after 15 mins to 170 if bread is darkening too quickly.

Bloody easy, don't need any gadgets, can make loaves into whatever shape you want.

thanks for all the replys wil work on this and ever i maage to eat a full slice I will post it on here
jim

Make sure you've got the correct yeast as the 'balls' of yeast aint suitable (in small tins), you gotta get the much smaller dried yeast (in packets) so check the packaging for use with bread makers. The 50% wholemeal recipes are the most successful IMO. And the pizza dough is 'to die for!'