February 19, 2020 - 12:56pm
Actual cost of making bread formula
Has anyone actually figured out what it costs to make bread at home? The cost of flour, leavening, salt, sweetener, salt, all other ingredients. Plus the factor of using the oven. It would be good to know these things to help justify making bread. I know that it is more healthy without all the added things that you read on the bread wrapper label, besides the fun and satisfaction. Just curious, and wondered if anyone has undertaken figuring out the total costs per standard load size. (4-1/2" X 8-1/2")
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I actively avoid knowing the costs of any of my hobby/addictions! I am not sure you can put a price on the enjoyment of critiquing a new bake experiment as a family however- it really is a pastime for us.
I've never run that actual calculation and in terms of ingredient cost it can vary from person to person depending on the quality of ingredients and formula. I buy 50 pound bags of flour typically and only pay about 17$ and I'm using my sourdough culture so the only other cost is the salt, water and gas to fire up my oven to bake it. Under that model the cost for a loaf is extremely cheap in terms of ingredient cost. The real cost is in the labor and making it fit into your schedule. If you made a high butter content brioche you're cost will go up for ingredients. It might be less labor intensive though, so you may find the labor side of it fits into your schedule more easily. The cost versus what you would pay for a good quality loaf is way more than the ingredient cost, you just have to find a way that it fits into your life in terms of the labor (which depending on the type of bread you want to make often isn't too daunting of a task).
As almost anything, making bread at home is cheaper than buying it at a supermarket or bakery. Flour, salt and yeast are extremely cheap (even if you get quality ingredients) and water and electricity costs can be basically neglected.
My standard sourdough bread is 500 g flour, 340 g water, 10 g salt (this includes 200 g starter). So a fairly large loaf.
1 kg of my flour costs 0.90$, 200 g good salt cost 1.50$, water and electricity let's say 0.10$ each (I'm just estimating all these amounts, I can't remember them exactly).
So 0.40$ for flour, 0,075$ for salt, 0.20$ for water and electricity ~0.68$ for a large boule (solely ingredients and production). Even if I estimated something wrong, that's still under 1$ for a bread that can feed a two person household for 2-3 days (or one if it tastes really great).
You can add extra "fees" for building a starter, fermentation time, work time (mixing, shaping), transport of ingredients and the finished loaf etc. Remember, by selling your bread, you sell all the work that goes into it, as well as the knowledge how to do it properly. Plus, people are probably willing to pay a little more if they know the baker and that your bread has no unnecessary additives. And every loaf is made personally for them, not massproduced like in a bakery.
If I actively wanted to sell my bread, I would probably charge 2.50 - 3.00$, plus a little more if there are any seeds, nuts, fruits etc.
Interesting... I've wondered that as well. Cost aside, I totally agree about schedule issues! I routinely joke that my job gets in the way of my bread making! ?