Made first loaf of bread by hand. With pic.

[Locut0s]

We have a bread machine that my father bought some time ago but for one reason or another that we never really pinned down it always made really heavy dense loafs. More like banana bread than store bought bread. To my knowledge we followed the recipes to the letter but it always came out really dense. So yesterday I thought I'd try my hand at making bread the old fashioned way. I've never done this before so I followed a beginners recipe here:

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/lessons/yourfirstloaf

I made sure to follow all the steps carefully, such as making sure the temp of the water was just right for proofing the yest and letting it triple rise (though they seem to be fairly lax in that recipe). Well the result while not perfect is a lot better than the bread machine loafs. It's still denser than I'd like but not too bad. It has perhaps a bit of a yeasty flavour but I quite like it actually. I'd call it a mild success. Part of the reason it didn't turn out 100% is probably that I substituted whole wheat flour for the regular flour in the recipe without changing any of the other amounts. Next I will try to perfect this recipe before moving on to raisin bread, cinnamon bread and others. Going to be fun. :awe:

 

[MAKENITO]

Looks yummy!!

 

[AndroidVageta]

Serrated knife. . . its your friend! And how many threads do you start a day?

 

[Locut0s]

Serrated knife. . . its your friend! And how many threads do you start a day?

That is a serrated knife. And yes I start a shit-load of threads

 

[SKORPI0]

Load of Bread in bulk quantity :awe:

 

[NikolaeVarius]

Now for the quality test. If you deform the bread, does it spring back to its original shape quickly?

 

[Newbian]

Now for the quality test. If you deform the bread, does it spring back to its original shape quickly?

You want him to squish his loaf?

 

[JEDI]

try the ATOT bread recipe in the Free Stuff forum. it was like $0.12/loaf

 

[Locut0s]

Now for the quality test. If you deform the bread, does it spring back to its original shape quickly?

Not nearly as fast as store bought but yes in 3 or 4 seconds it does. Like I mentioned it's still more dense than most store bought bread. Though not as bad as past loafs we made with the bread machine.

 

[KeithTalent]

Sweat Loaf!

Looks good man. Nothing like homemade bread! :awe:

KT

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Too dense is usually a symptom of too much flour, too little kneading or the wrong flour. Use high-gluten or bread flour and knead it very well. You want to develop the gluten to get the bread to bake airy.

 

[Adrenaline]

Looks good.

I bought my wife a breadmaker for Mother's Day and she loves it. She made some cinnamon rolls with it that were awesome. She found the recipe online. She has made all kinds of things with it.

 

[nonameo]

Try making it without wheat it some tries to get bread to hold its shape without it.
On the upside though, you don't have to knead the bread, let it rise multiple times or anything like that.

 

[Locut0s]

Too dense is usually a symptom of too much flour, too little kneading or the wrong flour. Use high-gluten or bread flour and knead it very well. You want to develop the gluten to get the bread to bake airy.

I kneaded it very well so I'm guessing it could be the amount of flour because I just substituted whole wheat which is heavier for all purpose. I will next try a real whole wheat recipe and adjust accordingly.

 

[Azraele]

Looks good.

 

[BoomerD]

You're gonna make a nice wife for some fellow one of these days...

My wife was a professional baker when I met her. Our kitchen used to be filled with the smell of fresh-baked breads all the time.

Her arthritis has gotten so bad that she rarely makes bread by hand nowadays. She has a Kitchen-Aid mixer with bread hooks that take MUCH of the hand work out...but not all of it.

We looked at the bread machines a few times and sampled breads made by people we know who own them. We've yet to find one that makes GOOD bread...light & airy yet still has texture.

 

[xSauronx]

I kneaded it very well so I'm guessing it could be the amount of flour because I just substituted whole wheat which is heavier for all purpose. I will next try a real whole wheat recipe and adjust accordingly.

yeah more than 1/2C or 1C of whole wheat flour in place of AP will fuck up a loaf pretty fast. you can get away with that much *usually* without any noticeable changes to the dough if youre using over 3 1/2C flour to start with. usually.

practice practice...then do your own pizza dough. best pizza youll ever have

/oh, and brioche, and croissants, and cinnamon rolls

 

[Locut0s]

You're gonna make a nice wife for some fellow one of these days...

Hay plenty of girls out there who can't cook to save their lives. They deserve a husband who can wow them in the kitchen too!

 

[herm0016]

home made bread is great. we make it when there is time.

 

[sandorski]

Try this recipe in your Bread Machine, but also add 1 tbls of Lemon Juice. If it still comes out real dense, I suspect your Bread Machine might be the culprit.