A few weeks ago my husband bought me a breadmaker for an early birthday present. I’ve wanted a bread maker for a LONG time. I’ve made my own breads, bagels and pizza doughs from scratch for awhile.
I just didn’t always make them as often as I would have liked.
- It’s very time consuming to make any kind of bread dough. I have a good stand mixer, but even with that doing most of the kneading, I still had to be pretty hands on deck
- yeast and temperatures can be finicky. At least for me. I have always had issues with my breads rising correctly
- laziness? It was just easier to buy bread at the store
Since I got this bread maker though…I haven’t bought one loaf of bread! I’ve been making it all from scratch. I’ve made french bread, regular white sandwich bread, wheat bread, pizza dough and bagels!
Everything rises and everything turns out PERFECT!
If I estimate a loaf of bread (we only buy the kind without high fructose corn syrup) cost me $2.50 and we go through 2 a week (yeah I know, we eat a lot of bread!)…the bread maker will have paid for itself in only 20 weeks. I’ll likely have it for years and years to come. When I also factor in everything else I can make in it, I bet this bread maker will easily pay itself off within half that time.
Here are some of my favorite recipes so far!
Bread Machine Bagels
from all recipes
Ingredients
- 1 cup warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 2 tablespoons white sugar
- 3 cups bread flour
- 2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
- 3 quarts boiling water
- 3 tablespoons white sugar
- 1 tablespoon cornmeal
- 1 egg white
- 3 tablespoons poppy seeds
Directions
- Place water, salt, sugar, flour and yeast in the bread machine pan in the order recommended by the manufacturer. Select Dough setting.
- When cycle is complete, let dough rest on a lightly floured surface. Meanwhile, in a large pot bring 3 quarts of water to a boil. Stir in 3 tablespoons of sugar.
- Cut dough into 9 equal pieces, and roll each piece into a small ball. Flatten balls. Poke a hole in the middle of each with your thumb. Twirl the dough on your finger or thumb to enlarge the hole, and to even out the dough around the hole. Cover bagels with a clean cloth, and let rest for 10 minutes.
- Sprinkle an ungreased baking sheet with cornmeal. Carefully transfer bagels to boiling water. Boil for 1 minute, turning half way through. Drain briefly on clean towel. Arrange boiled bagels on baking sheet. Glaze tops with egg white, and sprinkle with your choice of toppings.
- Bake in a preheated 375 degree F (190 degrees C) oven for 20 to 25 minutes, until well browned.
Another favorite of ours is the pizza dough recipe that came in the book my husband ordered with the machine. It makes enough for two crusts. I made the dough on Sunday morning before church and put half of it in the freezer and half of it in the fridge. When we got home from church, I let the dough sit on the counter for a bit, and than made fresh pizza for lunch!
Basic Pizza Dough
1 1/3 cups water
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
3 1/2 cups flour (I used bread flour)
1 tbspn sugar
1 1/2 tspn salt
2 tspn SAF yeast or 2 1/2 tspns bread machine yeast
- Place all of the ingredients in your bread machine according to your manufacturer’s instructions. Start the dough cycle
- When the machine beaps, immediately take the dough out and divide it into whatever portions you desire. Flatten each portion into a disc by kneading it a few times than folding the edges towards the center. Cover with a damp towel on the work surface to rest for 30 min until the dough has increased about 20% in size
- Roll out and shape the dough as directed in your pizza recipe. Or place the dough in plastic food storage bag and refrigerate up to 24 hours. To use, let dough sit for 20 min at room temp before rolling out. Dough may be frozen up to 3 months, let thaw overnight in the refrigerator before using
I love the fact that I am feeding my kids bread with simple ingredients and it isn’t requiring a ton of work for me to do so. The kids LOVE my sandwich bread. They call it mama bread and they beg for it all the time! That works for me!
Heather says
August 24, 2010 at 10:50 pmThat is so cool! That pizza looked awesome and so neat your kids love the bread. I don't know if I would have time for anything like that..but its neat that you can do it at home. A friend of mine made bread here at my house once and it was amazing. I need her to come back and make me more bread!
Thanks for stopping by my blog today!
familyfriendlyfrugality says
August 25, 2010 at 6:35 amThe bread machine makes it hardly any work at all. But there is something satisfying about really kneading into a big ball of dough, LOL.
thanks for stopping by!