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Adventures In Bread Making

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I just got my first bread maker, the Sunbeam 2 pound breadmaker and tonight I made my first loaf of bread, with this bread maker bread recipe. It turned out pretty well for a first attempt. You literally just put in the ingredients and press the button and three hours later, voila, a loaf of bread. The machine is pretty big, not as big as a microwave, but not far off and it does take up a good deal of room on the counter. It tasted pretty good.

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Now I will experiment with different recipes for this machine. That bread maker is not a top of the line one, but it had many good reviews on Amazon.ca, that’s why I got it. Now many might assume I got the machine mainly for my own use, but the truth is, I got it mainly to bake bread for the birds and the squirrels. It is less than half the price to make the bread from scratch than buy it at the store. I like to put bread out for the outdoor critters, but putting out loaves of $3 per loaf bread can get expensive if doing so a few times a week, so I thought this was a good solution.

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I am sure the neighborhood wildlife will be appreciative of my efforts on their behalf. People spend money on birdseed for birds, so why is baking the critters bread that much of a step? I’ve always put out stale bread for them rather than put it in the garbage, but they’d often come looking and nothing would be there for them. Perhaps not the standard use for a breadmaker, but it works for me.

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Every Dish Can’t Be Perfect

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While I am a good cook and an even better baker, two things I’ve never had a talent for making are bread and candy. They both seem to require a certain style, timing and finesse. Some people excel in some areas of the culinary arts and not others for some reason.

I’ve heard cooks on t.v. cooking shows say similar things, Rachael Ray says some are either cooks or bakers. Given the choice, I do prefer baking to cooking, but do both well, baking more so though.

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I tried once, and only once, to make bread with yeast. It turned out like a brick! I followed the instructions, yet somehow, it just didn’t work. Perhaps I should have tried more than once before giving up on the bread. It was a lot of work, kneading, rising, more kneading, resting, all for a brick like object that didn’t resemble bread. It didn’t taste horrible, but was as heavy as said brick.

Candy making seems to also require a certain touch, precise temperatures, a thermometer. I have tried to make fudge many fudgetimes, and a few times it turned out well, most of the times however it was gritty, not the goal. Lots of whipping, beating, tiring on the arms, all for a gritty brick.

So those are two areas I stay away from, and just buy bread and candy rather than attempt to make them myself. I guess given enough attempts and experimentation, I suppose I could master them both, but simply haven’t the desire.