Bread-making advice ...

[Debs]

I love Granary bread ( amongst others) and bought a Hovis bread

mix but was dismayed at the additives ( e-numbers galore)...

Does anyone have a good recipe for Granary?

bread- maker method or  hand-made.

I have tried hand-made method but produced bricks that the three

little pigs would never have had blown down!!!

also,

Which is best to use, dried yeast or fresh - if fresh how is it used.

I have seen it in Morrisons, but there were no instructions on the

pack ???


Please help, as I am sick of supermarket bread :-X

Debs :-*

[Debs]

[Svea]

will check my bread books later tonight or tomorrow :)
i always use dried yeast, as it's much easier. fresh yeast, if i remember correctly, has to be crumbled up into a mug, and stirred/dissolved in warm milk at just the right temperature, then added into a flour well and kind of left to its own devices for half an hour (to foam) before kneading it in.
that's why i use dried yeast ;) - it's miles easier.

svea

[aquilegia]

Buy yourself a bread maker. I got one for Christmas and haven't bought any bread since. Every morning we wake up to the smell of fresh bread. without having to lift a finger.

I mostly use wholemeal or granery flour and often add sunflower or pumpkin seeds. There's a recipe in the instruction book for granery. I get Hovis granery bread flour, rather than a bread mix - bread mixes are far too pricey.

Do not use out-of-date yeast - I did that once and ended up with a brick.

Make sure you knead for logn enough. Get a strong man to help with the kneading if necessary!

[Svea]

aqui,
i love my bread maker :) though i still havent unpacked it since we moved a month ago. about time to, i would say!

[aquilegia]

Svea - I couldn't survive without mine. The thought of going back to supermarket bread, yuck! get it out!

[wardy]

Aqui    Do you still have to knead the bread even with a bread maker?

Wardy

[wardy]

Debs I make bread in my food processor as I don't have to knead it and I'm so lazy I let it rise in the bowl

recipe   is   1 pound of flour,   2 tspns salt,     1 oz marg or butter (I use 1 fl oz of oil (about a teaspon) you could use more and it comes out like ciabatta
2 tspns or a 7 g sachet of dried yeast    half a pint of warm water

You can use any flour for this.  This only uses 1 pound of flour due to food pro bowl size but just double up to make a 2 lb loaf

if using the food pro you don;t have to mix the yeast with the water first and let it ferment for a while

[tim]

Our maker is me & the AGA!
Difficult to make recommendation because, if you follow a recipe to the letter, it will work.
In-date yeast, long kneading, slow rising - but not over-rising -  steam in the oven - they all help.

Machines? Great, so long as you don't fall for all the improvers which they need & recommend to get the result. Or don't object to their use. Or is that unkind??
Surely, real flour, yeast, salt, sugar & fat or oil are all that is neceesary.

Flour improvers :: Enzyme Systems; ascorbic acid; bromate substitutes; lecithin; malt flours; dough softeners; cysteine; acidity regulators; oxidizing agents and peroxides.

"To consider an application for azodicarbonamide to be added to the list of bread improvers permitted in the Bread and Flour Regulations 1963. The Pharmacology sub-Committee and their predecessor the Pharmacology Panel were also asked to consider the toxicity of azodicarbonamidea."

Just seen Wardy's thing. Yes - it works, but I believe the hard work works better.  And I do think that bread flour - or whatever is right for your special loaf - is important.

[aquilegia]

Wardy - no the machine does the kneading for you.

TIm - I only add vitamin c when using wholemeal bread, otherwise it's really heavy.

[wardy]

Tim  I don't fancy all those chemicals in bread and it's so unnecessary like all this dye in food which is causing so much furore at the mo.  I've had to check the lists over the last few days for my B & B (breakfast sauces) and it's astonishing what foods they put dye in (roast chicken  ???)  Surely food would be much cheaper if they left unnecessary stuff out.  Someone will have to pay for this latest food scare, eg us.

Interesting what you said about steam helping the bread.  Do you put a tray of water in the oven under the bread to cook?

Wardy

[tim]

We just chuck a couple of cupfuls in - being the AGA - spaced out. But a shallow pan would work. Vide-

"The best bread is baked in a wood fired oven. Wood guarantees a critical amount of moisture surrounding the bread for the first few minutes of baking. Not many of us have wood fired ovens, but a similar effect can be got by boiling a kettle, placing a flat oven-proof dish in the bottom of the oven, and as soon as you've put the bread into a shelf half-way up the oven, carefully and quickly pour 1/2 inch of boiling water into the oven-proof dish, then close the door immediately. The resulting steam will let the bread dough make a final extra rise during the first 5 minutes of baking."

[Debs]

... Interesting, shall have to try the steam tip.

Tim,

Do you use fresh or dried yeast  - if fresh, what method do you use?

Debs

[tim]

Oh, dear - thought someone would ask that!!

When we could get fresh yeast, from the baker or s/market, we used it, because I believe it has a better flavour. And one just had to think ahead & get it working before use.

Now - with all its additives - we use Fast Acting.
Whatever - always go for less yeast & longer rising. So think I!

[NattyEm]

I find the nicest bread is half and half, set the machine to dough then knock back and let rise again, and bake in the oven.  Though I don't do that often, I'm usually too lazy and just use the machine.  I'm not a fan of the mixes, I prefer to use organic bread flour.  For wholemeal and granary I tend to do it mixed with a proportion of white so the loaf is lighter.  I rarely make plain white bread as I don't really like it. 

Another trick to good bread when using the machine is to keep an eye on the initial mixing stage and add flour/water as needed as a lot can depend on the temp of your ingrediants and humidity of your house.  I use the fast acting yeast too for convienence but prefer the taste of fresh.  I hate supermarket bread, working in a bakery for 5 years helped with that!

And I've never put anything extra in it, no additives (besides those in the yeast already) no vit. c no anything else.

The funkiest bread I ever made was spinage bread, which we used to make christmas tree sandwiches out of for our christmas party two years ago.  The kids loved it, green bread!

[Svea]

hmm, now you are talking, emma.
yummy! sunday's favourite bread in sunny orange bread, which is made with orange juice instead of milk (or water). hmmmmmmmm

ok, let me dig my bread book out and give you a few receipes then. or have you been served, debs?

[tim]

When you get it hacked, Debs, you must try sun dried tomato bread. Red instead of green!

Do remember that you need a lot more water in wholemeal breads than white, & that evey batch of flour varies in absorption. So, it's a question of going by the feel - smooth & elastic but coming cleanly out of the bowl.
Adding flour to compensate for stickiness is usually fatal! It never gets absorbed evenly.

[Gadfium]

I too was initially disappointed, with bread produced in the bread-maker, with the recipes provided... then I found out that nearly all the machines are for the American Market and that's why the dried milk and sugar additions are stipulated.

I did a bit of reading, then ditched these recipes AND the strong bread flours I was buying from the supermarkets (no idea how long since they were packed, source(s) of the flour etc...)

I started searching for a flour supplier, and found one on the web which had just begun to supply direct to home bakers as well as 'the trade'. It labelled the flour with the names & locations of the farms from which the grain had been produced, and stated clearly that although you could store flour, it was best used relatively swiftly (six months). All the ingredients were labelled too... a very nice short list - no strange 'flour treatment agents' here.

A simple recipe for use in bread-making machines was also given, plus the programme needed (the straightforward 'white loaf on normal time - NOT rapid' button regardless of the type of their bread flour used) :

7g dried fast acting yeast
500g flour
10g butter (I often just sling a bit of olive oil in instead)
1.5 tsp salt
300-320 mls water

Last year the water was advised to be reduced to 270-300mls since the grain that year needed a little less. Now that's what I call keeping your customers informed.

'But the postage!' I can hear you wail...

Nope. The initial charge can be high £6.35. Gulp.... But, and it's a very big 'but', if you buy between 24Kgs and 30Kgs of flour this DROPS to £3.00 in total. That's £3.00 p/p for the lot. Now I could spend that in petrol getting to the shops.

The flour is - in my opinion - great.  The variety available is mouth-watering, and I've watered my mouth through I good deal of the choice. They have many strong bread flours including: white, wessex, wholemeal, apple & cinnamon ( :)), sunflower, onion (delicious cold, or toasted with pate on top), six seed (heaven), mixed grain (just as good), oats n bran, french, soft grain (slobber).....

Flour size - in bags, 1.5kg, 10kg, 16kg, 25kg bags (varies according to the mix).

The web site for this wondrous array is at www.clarksflour.sagenet.co.uk.... enjoy!

[wardy]

Very informative post there which I enjoyed reading very much  :)  Homemade bread is so moreish that it usually disappears very quickly so don't know whether it's cost effective.  I don't think that's the point though.  It's the same reason why we want to grow our own veg - cos we want to know what's on them!  I have toyed with the idea of getting a bread machine but not sure I have the room unless I get rid of some of my other gadgets  ;D

[Lady of the Land]

I make all my own bread either by hand or in a breadmaker. Even when making a rustic wholemeal loaf I do not use any additives.
I agree with Tim long slow rise helps to make it lighter. The rustic wholemeal in the breadmaker takes 5 hours almost, but results in a delicious tasting loaf. You can also add a variety of seeds ie. pumpkin or sesame.

[tim]

Sudden thought in the night.

Especially with wholemeal flour, things often seem very dry. DON'T chuck in cups of water until you have really kneaded the stuff.

If youmust add water, do it spoon by spoon - kneading well between each. Be patient!!