What's Your Opinion on Bread Making Machines


Hi Louis,

I saw a Silvercrest breadmaker in Lidl the other day for £35 and was tempted, largely because it makes a big (1.2 Kg) loaf and uses 2 paddles, rather than one. In the end I kept my money and for the moment I'm sticking with my Kenwood breadmaker, which I think is okay.

Anyway, I saw your post while looking around on the internet for the ultimate white loaf recipe. What surprised me about your recipe was the absence of sugar. Nearly every recipe I've ever seen lists sugar or if it doesn't then honey or malt extract are in there.

Is this a mistake, or do you really have no source of carbohydrate/sugar other than the flour itself?

Ian
 
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Silvercrest breadmaking machine Lidl

I have one of these and although I have the manual it is not easy to follow.

Can anyone help.

Also one part of the instructions says to mix the dough yourself in a bowl then place dough in breadmaker. Surely the whole idea of a breadmaking machine is for it to do the dough and bake the bread for you.??
 

In answer to your question, there should be no need to premix the ingredients.

Always put the liquid in first, and then the dry ingredients and the machine should do the rest.

You should check out the food and drink section of www.boards.ie

There are loads of threads and lots of information anout using breadmakers and the pros and cons.
 
breadmaker

Just finishing my toast ( bread from a breadmaker ) and jam when I happened upon this thread. Yum Yum.

I have a panasonic breadmaker for about 2 years. We love it. I put in all the dry ingredients first then the water.

Advantages:
1. Timer for fresh loaf in the morning
2. Leftover bread makes very good breadcrumbs for goujons
3. No washing up whatsoever.

Disadvantages

Eating yummy toast and jam at this hour of the night!!
 

I've had a Panasonic bread maker too for a couple of years. I'd recommend it, too - very simple to use (just measure and place ingredients into it, in the right order - two minutes max), very good bread, and very little cleaning to do afterwards.
 
Glad someone dragged up this thread again as Lidl here (in Germany) are doing the breadmaker on Thursday and for once I'd actually be able to go early in the morning and get one before they're all gone (day off work, yippee!). I've been hmming and hawing over a bread machine for a while but think it would be worth going for. I have made bread before but don't really have any decent counter space or table for kneading. And then it occurred to me that there is a space in the hall that would be a perfect size for a bread machine (and that should stop me just dumping any old stuff there, too). Also I just opened up my last pot of homemade raspberry jam and can't be anything better than fresh bread for that.
 
Oooh, and also just read the specifications of the Silvercrest machine from Lidl and they say it can also be used for making jam. Even better. Has anyone done that with it?
 
I think you would be better off to buy a preserving pan if you are going to make jam. It's heavy and jam doesn't stick to it. You have to evaporate the water off the jam at a high temperature which is hard to do in an ordinary saucepan without burning it.
 
We never use ours>

It is a wast of money and a wast of shelf space. You have to buy special shop mix and it tasts awfu. Dont wast your money. We never use ours.

Bread is the cheapest product you can purchase and there is no vat.
If you bake your own you are paying VAT on the product at the higt rate and also on the electricity.
 

You do not have to buy a special shop mix.
The ingredients to make bread in a breadmaker are exactly the same as if you make it yourself.

Strong flour
Instant yeast
water
sugar ( optional)
salt (optional)

Given the price of the ingredients above, a loaf of homemade bread is far cheaper than shop bought, especially if you compare it to a proper loaf and not a cheap industrial sliced pan.

You are correct that cheap nasty industrial sliced pan is one of the cheapest foods you can buy and its awful, you cant compare to freshly baked bread using quality ingredients.
 
I now have a Lidl bread maker and am reaching the same conclusions. I have just tested Tesco Strong Flour, kneaded it only with the bread machine with water content on the high side (but still able to pull away from the container walls), gave it about 10+ hours to rise (and it certainly did, I had to divide the 800gr mix in two and left only half in the machine).

I did not use the last heated accelerated rising stages, stopping the machine immediately after the kneading stages were complete. The subsequent multi-hour rising was at low or room temperature.

I used half for a pizza, and it produced the blandest tasting dough I have tried so far. The dough was however had the best texture, stretching well. The most impressive pizza dough demonstrations that I have seen seem to rely on soft and fine flour (0 or 00 grade, the finests), plenty of mixing/kneading before and after rising, and plenty of time for rising/autolysis. I notice that Odlums Plain Flour has a protein (and therefore presumably gluten to a large extent) concentration of 10.8% (by weight) and Tesco Strong Flour has a value of 12.6%, which is not much more.

Can a longer rising time not compensate for the slightly lesser protein/gluten concentration of a soft flour ? Is strong flour primarily for those where time is money such as professional bakers?

I used the bake cycle in the machine for the other half, and it produced the lightest bread I have made so far (after 24+ hrs of rising). The bread was ok, however I will be trying other flours and water concentrations etc. I also plan to test something like vegan lard or suet.

The best tasting pizza dough I have tried so far used Odlums Cream Plain or Self-Raising Flour (I forget which) with 8+ hours rising time to allow for autolysis. Presumably long rising times also allow for small amounts of yeast.

Note both Odlums Cream Plain and Self-Raising flours contain the same three raising agents, though presumably in different concentration. Neither is listed as fortified with Calcium Carbonate (chalk), Iron, Niacin or Thiamin in the ingredients. Tesco's Strong Flour does not contain raising agents, however it does have these four post-WWII fortifiers.

I am making vegan "pizza" (vitza ?). Without the effect of cheese more reliance is placed on the base and tomato sauce. Cheese can partially cover a dull sauce or base. I prefer the sauce more concentrated, and a little pepper, vegetable stock (which contains pepper), garlic/granules, oil, and a small amount of sugar (to counter any bitterness) are some of the things that can be added to the sauce if desired. Green olives work very well as a strong topping, along with thinly sliced onion and bell peppers.

As for the machine, I would like an option to knead but not rise, and to pause before rising for as many hours as desired. The current solution is to time operations and stop or stop/pause/start manually. In fact ideally there would be the ability to program in any desired operation sequence/durations. Perhaps this option is available on a more expensive machine.

The machine is very simple, one motor, and one heating element. Probably a temperature sensor and a motor over current sensor are included, and of course some switches and the display. For those with moderate circuit and printed circuit board skills it would not be technically very difficult to replace the PCB/uC and program in the desired functions, a task however that can wait for now (& of course please do not attempt this if you do not consider yourself qualified to work with 240VAC circuits).

 
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