November 22, 2011 - 6:05pm
How much does it cost to bake a loaf of bread?
I realize there are a lot of variables re: cost per kWh, size of oven, temperature, length of bake, etc.
In general, assuming an average loaf of bread in an average home oven preheated and baked for an average length of time.
Price per kWh in Colorado in Winter 2011 = $0.0460. (That seems low for some reason).
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http://www.flournwater.com/food_014.htm
My question could have been more clear: I'm asking about energy cost, not ingredient cost.
Thanks, though.
I wish electricy in the UK was that cheap! It averages at around the eqivalent of $0.17 per kwh over here and is rising all the time. I tend to bulk bake a lot more than I used to to cut down on my usage. I haven't costed out a loaf for a couple of years but last time I did it was about 70p (about 1$ give or take). Not too bad really.
Regards,
Gary
I kept coming up with ~$3 a bake, which couldn't be right, especially considering your energy cost is 4x mine.
(Cost goes up in the summer to .10 kWh. If I had to pay .17, I'd move to the North Pole in the summer).
Last time I measured the energy used to preheat my oven and bake a loaf it came to something like 2.5-3 kwh.
So I figured that I used about 27p worth of electric for the bake. Flour and salt for a 750g loaf would be about 43p. So about 70p per loaf.
However, I rarely bake less than three loaves at a time now so actually my loaves are probably more like 52p each these days. Seems pretty reasonable for decent (even if I do say so myself) loaf of sourdough.
But yes, sadly, here in the UK we have an increasing problem with what is termed fuel poverty. This winter there will be far too many people over here having to make a choice between heating or eating.
Gary
What? Are you in the pay of big oil/coal? Just because the UK has massive coal reserves available at low cost, and just because you have centuries worth of natural gas, you complain about a little sacrifice in the pursuit of renewable, green, and non-global warming energy? Why, your own PM's father-in-law has sacrificed acre upon acre of beautiful countryside to the installation of wind turbines that generate almost 8% of their nameplate capacity and get revenue for total capacity in concern for your welfare. The hundreds of thousands of Pounds rental per annum has nothing to do with it, I'm sure. /sarc
Here in Texas, we use a lot of energy to cool our homes and businesses, so we can appreciate the need for inexpensive electricity. And yet, the state subsidizes wind power (we have more turbine capacity than any other state), and the transmission lines to carry the lecky from the edge of nowhere to the urban centers hundreds of miles away. That same wind power damned near brought down the grid last winter when they all went down due to winter storms; wind requires 100% backup 100% of the time.
Sorry for the ot rant.
cheers,
gary
We should probably all drive Hummers, keep our homes at 68 F and our children be dammed if they have to freeze in the dark.
Sorry for the rant ;)
Gerhard
If you can afford the Hummer and its gas, why not? Why would your children freeze at 68℉? As for in the dark, it's only half of the diurnal. ;)
cheers,
gary
There was an article in the Guardian or other saying she was going around Buckingham Palace turning off lights.
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I'll have to isolate what's going on with my new place. I never turn the central heating on (one of the benefits of living on the top floor) and I have the water heater on low, but my electricity bill is reporting ~600 kWh per month. I suspect I have a electrical engineer as a neighbors and he's switched the wiring around. Perhaps it's the Queen herself! I'd think I could run a bakery on 600 kWh, so the energy has to be going somewhere.
I have a gas stove, it does use electricity to turn the gas on but that's about it, and the gas costs more than the electric bill, I pay in equal installments on both the gas and electricity so have no idea how much it would cost to bake a loaf of bread. But it would depend on wheather or not I baked in summer or winter, the power useage is generally higher in summer, and the gas in winter, so it sort of varies.
I think that you need to look at your power consumption with one of those thingys that you plug into the outlet and then plug the item into, that would tell you what each item is using, and if its outrageous then you can deal with the items one by one. I know that I have 3 freezers, a large fridge with freezer, and two small dorm fridges a computer, and several other appliances that use electricity all the time, a washer and dryer that use it on demand, a car plug in that is in use all winter, and of course my lights which some are on timers and some are switch only, I've actually gone down in usage this year and my monthly payment for both the gas and the electric is a bit cheaper than last year, and I'm hoping the new 7000 dollar furnace and water heater will lower the gas consumption even more.
But it does sound like you are using a lot for an apartment, since my daughter lived in one here (and we have higher prices than yours I do believe) and paid only 40 dollars a month for the hydro and heating was included in her rent. And believe me landlords are so cheap here that they wouldn't do that if it cost them too much.
I contacted the home owner's association about it and they solved the mystery.
It seems like I'm on the hook for a share of the building's energy cost as well as my own.
That'll teach me to read the lease before signing it.
It's one of those "modern" complexes with all of the amenities: sauna, heated pool, heated parking, theatre, etc., so I guess that explains it.
Maybe I'll start using the sauna to proof my loaves. :D
What about the cost of the sourdough starter I bought on line and the dough mixer from Poland and the glass jar for the sourdough starter, the KA mixer and the bread bowl and the banatton and then the Boyd & Taylor proofer the pizza peel and the stone....the cheapest part is the energy to bake the bread for 30 minutes. I'm just finishing cutting up the appetizer size loaves I made of New York Deli Style Carraway Rye bread which I use as a platform for my chopped liver. I serve it to two different house holds for Thanksgiving. The bread and liver turned out great. Had to go out and buy 5 pounds more of fresh liver, I did not like the first batch. Picky picky picky. Got to be perfect. Most people think chopped liver is so awful anyway that they can't understand how I can descern a good batch from a not so great batch. I can. The chicken fat with fried onions are really sweet this time. We can always call 911 when the chest pain hits.........
Stu B. Minneapolis, Mn.
Sounds like a meal Iwould enjoy, I think people that don't like liver have never had good liver or did not approach it with an open mind.
Gerhard