Breadmakers

[buzzingtalk]

Nice one - my mum has a breadmaker but you have to knead beforehand so didnt know if there were self-kneading ones.

Are there recipes for normal bread, all of the bread I buy just has yeast/water/flour stuff in it, no oil, no dairy. I don't really like oil much tbh and don't eat dairy, I mainly want bread for dipping into soups so it doesn;t need to be mega bread

[buzzingtalk]

Found a bread recipe for the sort of stuff I usually eat:

• 1kg/just over 2lb strong bread flour
• 625ml/just over 1 pint tepid water
• 30g/1oz fresh yeast or 3 x 7g/¼oz sachets dried yeast
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 level tablespoon fine sea salt
extra flour for dusting

I've never heard of bread having egg/milk/oil in it - is this common? I've never seen it before. Is it more used in white bread, as I don't eat white stuff, only wholemeal?

[lindyloo]

i have thought about getting a bread maker, but can someone tell me how expensive they are to actually run. i am motivated, not only by taste and smell, but trying to save money, so by the time you have bought the ingredients and the electric usage, how much has a basic loaf cost to produce?

[Phoenix]

Nice one - my mum has a breadmaker but you have to knead beforehand so didnt know if there were self-kneading ones.

Mine is a panasonic one, a few years old by now, and it came with its own wee recipe booklet. For standard white bread the recipe says to use strong white bread flour, salt, sugar, yeast, milk powder and water, but you could leave out the milk powder, of course. If you'd like proportions BT I'll check the booklet when I get home.

What I tend to do is fling in a 500g bag of bread mix and a full mug of water, and switch it on, basic bread setting, medium size, 4 hours later, yumyumyum. Pretty basic stuff.

Nix

[Hilary B]

I've never included the milk powder when using a bread maker (just as I never included milk in hand-made bread, unless I specifically wanted a milk-bread) and while a little oil/butter makes the bread keep better, it isn't essential. At one time I was using one about 3-4 times a week (because going shopping was complicated, so I couldn't buy fresh bread as often as I would have liked, even if I could be sure of finding the good stuff).
The ingredients (if you don't buy mixes) work out about half the price of the cheapest 'real bread' (ie, not sliced and pre-packed, but otherwise nothing special), and it shouldn't cost more than about 10p in electricity (probably quite a bit less) per loaf.
If you want to work out the cost for yourself, somewhere on the machine (or the box in the shop) it should give the power rating in Watts. Multiply this by operating time in hours (most cycles are between 2 and 4 hours, a few may be shorter or longer), divide by 1000 and multiply what your electricity supplier charges per kWh (or 'unit') and that is the MAXIMUM cost. The amount of electricity used in the 'timer' phase (when baking overnight) is going to be too small to calculate (maybe 1p a month if you bake several times a week, but even that is probably too high) and it is unlikely to be using the full amount throughout the cycle anyway.

[stella]

Hi I just got my first breadmaker given by someone on Freecycle. It was an unwanted wedding present and its new!!!!! Yah

[wssla00]

i have thought about getting a bread maker, but can someone tell me how expensive they are to actually run. i am motivated, not only by taste and smell, but trying to save money, so by the time you have bought the ingredients and the electric usage, how much has a basic loaf cost to produce?

My plain loaves work out at about 40p per big loaf to make including the electric. I have a panasonic and although the initial outlay was more expensive, the bread is definitely delicious. better than the one I got from Argos for a tenner in the sale!

[Croila]

I've had my breadmaker for nearly a week now and have tried all sorts of loaves with different types of flour. I've now hit on a recipe I like and will use for everyday purposes: the flour is £1.39 a bag and that makes two loaves.

Trouble is, the loaves aren't as long as the ones you buy in the shops so you get fewer slices, and fewer slices means you have to bake more of them! So I'm going to see how much I spend on breadmaking supplies over the course of this month, but I really hope it'll work out a bit cheaper than buying it from Tescos cause I am trying really hard to get my food budget down!

[Croila]

Hi I just got my first breadmaker given by someone on Freecycle. It was an unwanted wedding present and its new!!!!! Yah

Oh you jammy so and so! What a brilliant stroke of luck!