That’s pretty much it. I love it.
I’ve been making bread at home since covid. Used my Kitchen Aid stand mixer with the dough hook until now, but that always left a huge mess to clean up. Now I prep a week’s worth of dry ingredients in ziplock bags and only have to clean up one mess. I use butter powder rather than regular, and that makes things super convenient.
Before I go to bed, I dump in the water and one of the ziplock bags, set the timer, and have fresh bread waiting for me in the morning.
I don’t think I’ll ever buy one, the idea of an appliance that takes up that much space and only does a small number of things I already do without it doesn’t appeal that much to me.
Although I want to point out these machines make more than just bread. Off the top of my head you can make jam with it, when some fruits are going out of season and going for cheap it definitely looks like less cleanup than making jam the regular way.
Does it mostly create soft breads like sandwich bread or is it also able to create crunchy baguette or thick crust pain de campagne ?
It’s got 18 different style recipes (or you can program your own). Right now, I’ve just made soft bread like I’d been making with the Kitchen Aid.
So it means it does? I guess you need to cook those with an oven to make the crispy crust?
I think it’ll do the crispy crust, but depending on what you’re making, it can only prepare the dough and you’ll have to bake it in a regular oven. Its baking pan is kind of shaped like a small bucket, so everything bakes into that shape.
I had bread machines for awhile, but they all invariably broke down, the last one leaking horribly. I’ve taken to using my stand mixer to make the dough without having to knead, and it’s been working for me! Not quite as set and forget though. Unless I want to take a nap to bread rising and wake up to dough taking over the kitchen!
Congratulations! We got a bread machine at a thrift store a few months ago and it’s been life changing. We use it a few times a week now. So much fun to mess around with ingredients. Speaking of which, butter powder?? What is that? I feel like this could be great for out on the boat.
It’s kind of like powdered milk. I’m not sure about getting it at the grocery store (never looked) but the stuff I have is marketed as survival food. Comes in a big can and you reconstitute it with water.
It’s great for baking and seasoning (put some in a salt shaker and go to town on your popcorn; so good), but it doesn’t work like regular butter in all cases (e.g. it’s not great for sauteing).
I’m lactose intolerant, so I switched to buying powdered milk at the grocery store ages ago since the small cartons I’d buy for cooking always went bad before I used them up. Haven’t had a problem with butter going bad, but figured for baking it’d be easier to just toss the powder in with the dry ingredients like I do with the milk. Seems to work well.
Interesting! Thank you so much for the personal experience using it, I’ll see if I can find some. Cheers!
It’s pretty common in bulk food outlets, you mix a little water in the butter powder, then chill overnight.
Ok cool, I’ll see if Bulk Barn has it. Thanks!
I got mine in 2016 and never looked back. In fact the husband won’t even touch store bought bread anymore, he’s that spoilt :D
After I first started making bread at home, yeah, same reaction: spoilt and never looked back. Though I do keep a loaf of store bought whole wheat on hand occasionally.
Store-bought white bread is just too sweet; like a really crappy, unfrosted cake.
As much as I love baking my bread, I do miss the ease of my bread machine.
