Why not make your own bread?

There’s nothing to beat home made fresh bread. I haven’t bought a loaf from a shop for over five years now, if I have to eat a slice of shop bought bread, at a friends house for instance, I really notice how ‘artificial’ it seems compared to ‘real’ bread. Shop bought bread has a spongy texture that is nothing like the real thing, I wonder what they do to it that makes it like that. I suppose its a matter of keeping costs as low as possible for the manufacturer and putting in ingredients so it keeps for a while without going off.

I use a bread machine to do the mixing and kneading, and then I do the final rise in a warm place in the kitchen and bake it in my small oven. In my experience this is the best way to get a great loaf with least effort, it all gets eaten so there’s no waste and its far nicer and no more expensive than shop bought bread.

I’ve never owned an expensive bread maker, so I can’t really comment on them, but my cheap automatic bread maker is great. I find they last around two years when used more or less daily, and cost about £30 - £40 to buy, which isn’t bad because they really do take the work out of the process.

You can, of course, use the bread maker the way its supposed to be used, to make the loaf for start to finish. But I find that the shape isn’t so handy for cutting and the hole in the bottom, where the mixer paddle goes, makes some slices badly formed.

My best recipe for home made bread

1 1/4 cups tepid water
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/4 teaspoons natural sugar
1 teaspoon salt
560 grams (20 oz) strong bread flour
1 1/2 teaspoons fast action dried yeast

Place in bread machine on dough setting

When it beeps (mine takes 1 1/2 hours) knock back the dough lightly and put in a bread pan in a warm place to rise to double its size

Cook for 27 minutes at 200 degrees C.

Enjoy!