Bread making machines

@pamsdish http://www.mysupermarket.co.uk/tesc..._spreads/tesco_light_vegetable_suet_200g.html

 

I have never used the price alert function, wish they would add Morrisons as I use them quite a lot.

 

Never bought one but started having a go at baking by hand about 12 months ago. Very enjoyable and kneeding the dough was very anti stressful and the end result can be very rewarding. Only downside is fresh home made bread doesn't seem to last very long. It goes stale very quick. I'm not convinced the cost of buying a breadmaker or doing it by hand outweighs the cost of buying a loaf unless you intend to consume it in a couple of days. Otherwise you end up with a lot of waste and half eaten loaves which end up as bird food.

In my honest opinion baking your own bread is a bit like brewing your own beer. It's an enjoyable hobby but if you're not careful you will end up spending more money for a far inferior product. Only do it if you enjoy doing it. If your intent is to save money then it could end up costing you more in trail and error.

 

But then again is life just about saving money and doing things as cheaply as possible versus enjoyable?

I wonder that when I pay £20 worth of wool to make a jumper when I could find one in the market ready made for £7 !

 

I sometimes bake a loaf and when cold, I wrap half in foil and cling film and freeze it for 2 or 3 days time when the first half has gone. I don't eat a lot of bread or toast ,but what I do eat I like to be of the best quality,
Jenny

 

It's the satisfaction you get when you've made your own don't you think....be it a jumper ,food or whatever it is you've taken time over.....
I've wasted more money buying inferior tasting bread and other things so i prefere to make my own...the only downfall is....i eat too much of it

 

What a grand sight Loli. They look delicious and 100% better than anything you can buy in the High Street and you have the "feel good factor " as well.
Just dig up the lawn and relay it if you want to burn off some calories..
Jenny

 

You could add a pinch of citric acid as a preservative.

Bag of flour costs £1. can make 5 loaves out of that. Tastes much better than the cheap bread in the supermarkets, which isn't very cheap anymore.

Can make 30 bottles of wine for around 50p a bottle, 30 bottles of cheap wine from the shop is around £120 so a saving of £105.

 

Never thought about the citric acid and also freezing. Never occurred to me to do that with fresh bread. Maybe make some small batches and freeze a few.

I've been home brewing for years and still don't think even the best kits taste very nice. Always taste quite chemically and nothing like the real thing so now I only brew beer and wine for cooking with. I've ended up spending a fortune on equipment then paying £10 for a kit and throwing it all down the drain so now I just buy my wine from Aldi.

Maybe I'm just not doing it right but having tried and thrown countless amounts of bread and wine in the bin after poor results, I've come to the conclusion it's easier and cheaper to just leave it to the experts.

 

I lob ends of loaves in the freezer, then make a bread pudding when i've got enough.

Thats strange with the beer, used to make some lovely brews from kits. Did you rack the brew off into a pressure barrel?

 

i buy the Tesco effervescent Vitamin C tabs & crush about a 1/4 of a tab for each bread

 

Cor, fizzy bread

I've got a pot of it mainly for wine making, its labled,

For a very good reason

 

anyone use Macadamia Nut Oil in their breads? i usually use Olive Oil but i have used Macadamia Nut Oil many times as it's a really healthy oil but i've just discovered that Macadamia nuts (in any form) are highly toxic to dogs! our dogs often get some of my breads! good lord, i could have poisoned my fur babies!

 

We've used a Panasonic breadmaker for years (a decade at least, and we had a different brand before that). It gets used 3 or 4 times a week ... tastes far better than shop bought bread, and we can have a freshly baked loaf wherever we like, but in addition we have found it solved another problem.

Both Mrs K and her father had grumbling stomach ache / irritable bowel for years, others in their family are coeliac. They found when we were in France they didn't have the same problem that they did in UK. By process of elimination they found that certain types of bread in the UK were OK, but regular bread was a problem. Turns out it was the "improvers" in flour, which the French don't bother with, and is part of the reason that their bread is stale by supper time!

Mrs K doesn't have any problem with home made bread.

Just bought a bread maker for my daughter. It only makes a single size small-ish (1 lb) loaf, but that will be ideal for her. £39 which I thought was a bargain, and it has good reviews. I'll let you know when we have tried a loaf in it.

http://www.morphyrichards.co.uk/pro.../breadmakers/48330-Daily-Loaf-Breadmaker.html

 

The price is right Kristen but like you I'm a Panasonic convert and swear by it. I'll be interested to see how this compares though,
Jenny