The Fresh Loaf

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Favorite Best-Ever Bread Machine Recipe for bread Baked IN the machine?

Janknitz's picture
Janknitz

Favorite Best-Ever Bread Machine Recipe for bread Baked IN the machine?

When the rest of the Northern Hemisphere starts to cool off, we get our warmest weather.  It was in the hundreds this week (Farenheit).  I am a perfectly adequate bread baker, but when it's too hot to heat the oven (we have no AC), I pull the old bread machine out of the garage out of desparation.

Now, back in the day, I often made dough in the machine, then shaped the dough and baked it in the oven (nowadays I use my hands or my KA), but during these hot times I don't want to heat the oven, so that means that I have to bake in the machine, which rarely produces a satisfying loaf.  (Yes, I do know the trick of removing the paddle at the beginning of the last rise so I don't have "holey bread"). 

I'm looking for favorite, best-ever bread machine recipes that hold up to the bread machine method of baking and taste great.  My machine is a fairly basic one--an old Toastmaster that can handle a 1 1/2 lb vertical loaf.  I weigh out my ingredients and I'm OK with baker's math, so if you have a recipe for a larger ABM, I can reduce it.  

Just as an aside, last week I was making a basic loaf of white bread in the machine for the kids, but I took the dough out at the END of the cycle instead of the beginning to remove the paddle (I'm a bit rusty, since last summer's heat).  When I realized it needed to rise again and my machine isn't programmable, I put it in a loaf pan to bake, even though the house was hot.  I turned the oven on to preheat, got distracted reading a book, and the dough proofed for about 2 hours.  Giant bubble loaf.  Frustrated, I baked it anyway.  It actually shrunk in baking to a more normal size and was light and fluffy as a cloud.  My kids loved it (it was a bugger to slice!), but YUCK--even fluffier than Wonderbread ;-@

 

Janknitz's picture
Janknitz

I'll give it a try.  

gary.turner's picture
gary.turner

One little thing I've done to give the flavor a kick is to leave out the yeast, and stop the machine right after the initial 3 minute mix (or whatever your machine's cycle calls for). Let the dough rest (autolyse) for 30 minutes to an hour, the sprinkle the yeast over the dough and restart the machine from scratch. I've also moved the (plastic covered) bucket to the fridge overnight. If you do that, you'll probably want to let it warm to room temp before pitching the yeast and restarting the machine.

As much as I love  the bread machine for its simplicity and ease, there's no substitute for the oven and the baker's hands; unless the temp's pushing 40C which taxes the A/C and the baker. :)

cheers,

gary