, covered with a tea towel, for hours til it doubles in size again. This step is optional but it makes 2 much lighter loaves instead of one heavy one.
Brush crust w/ butter when it comes out.
BREADMAKING TIPS
I found this following notes somewhere online, possibly from more than one source. I wish I could remember where and give credit because they sure were helpful to me while getting my recipe right.
FLOUR
Bread Flour makes better bread. I know you don’t want to hear that but it is true. Bread flour is made from hard wheat so it has more gluten, or wheat protein, in it than regular all-purpose flour. All-purpose flour is a blend of hard and soft wheat. This makes it serviceable for biscuits, cakes and quick breads, which prefer soft wheat flour; and also serviceable for yeast bread, which prefers hard wheat flour. It is called all-purpose flour because it is designed to be used for all baking purposes.
Bread flour is made for yeast bread. If you don’t have bread flour then you may use all purpose flour for most bread recipes. Your results will not be exactly the same as if you had used bread flour, but you will still have good results, and you will still get good bread. Sometimes you will need to add a tiny bit more flour to your dough if you use all-purpose flour. This isn’t always true but it is sometimes.
Different brands of bread flour produce different textured breads. I use the cheapest bread flour I can find and have always been very pleased with the results. Bread flour costs a little bit more than all-purpose flour. I consider it worth the extra cost.
SALT
Salt is a necessary ingredient in machine made bread. It regulates the rising process so that the bread dough doesn’t spill over the bread bucket into the machine. I have read that it takes at least 1/4-teaspoon of salt per pound of bread to regulate it properly. I don’t know if this is true or not. If it is though then it means that you can reduce the amount of salt in a 2 lb recipe to a minimum of 1/2-teaspoon. Salt also adds flavor to the bread. Bread made completely without salt doesn’t taste as good as bread made with some salt.
SWEETENERS
Sugar, honey and other sweeteners soften the texture of the dough and the finished loaf. They also contribute to the browning of the bread and the crispness of the crust. The main role they play though is as easy-to-use-food for the yeast. Yeast can use the starch in flour for it’s food but it is much happier if it gets an easy to use food like sugar or honey. Most bread machine recipes call for at least a small amount of sugar. A very few may not, like machine made French bread, or occasionally pizza crust. If desired you may add between a teaspoon and a tablespoon of sugar to recipes that don’t call for any sweeteners of their own but you don’t really have to.
Bread machine breads do best if they don’t have too much sugar added to them. When making sweet dough from scratch it isn’t unusual to add a full cup of sugar to the dough. When making sweet dough in the machine though it is better to use 1/4 to 1/2-cup of sugar or honey at the very most. This is because the dough rises faster and higher in a bread machine than it does when prepared by hand. Too much sugar is too much food for the yeast and it gets over-excited. This can result in a machine made mess that is unpleasant to clean up.
LIQUIDS
Liquids used in a bread machine should be room temperature or a little bit warmer. You should never use hot liquids in a bread machine. Liquids that are too hot will kill the yeast. Room temperature liquids make the yeast happy. If you are using tap water then warm tap water is fine. If you are using yogurt or buttermilk you may want to take it out of the fridge to warm up a bit before you use it in the bread machine. This isn’t strictly necessary, especially for breads baked on the Basic Cycle or longer. If you are using the Rapid Cycle though it is imperative that the liquids be warm or at least at room temperature.
Milk, buttermilk, and yogurt make the finished loaf of bread softer and give it a finer crumb. With milk or buttermilk, I usually use warm tap water and add powdered milk or dry buttermilk with my dry ingredients. If you have any whey leftover from making cheese it makes a very finely crumbed bread. It tastes really good too, better than you would think. Also runny yogurt that didn’t set up quite right is great in breads.
If you are making bread with water and you want to try something fun for a change, add a spoonful of vinegar along with the liquid ingredients. You will not taste the vinegar in the finished bread but the acid in it will keep the bread fresh for a little while longer after it is baked. This is an old-fashioned trick that still works well today.
FATS
Fats make the finished loaf richer, softer, and also keep the dough from sticking to the non-stick surface of the bread pan (weird, huh?). Usually between 1 and 4-tablespoons of fat are used in a 2 lb loaf of bread machine dough. You can use most fats interchangeably in a bread machine. Margarine, oil, shortening, lard, chicken fat, bacon grease or butter will all give you pretty much the same results. Some of the fats will add a different flavor, and the texture of the bread will change very slightly, depending on which type of fat you use. The changes however, are minor so you can pretty much use whichever type of fat you prefer. Most often I use margarine or oil.
Solid fats do not have to be melted before adding them to the bread machine. It helps if they are at room temperature, but this isn’t always practical. I have added a couple of tablespoons of cold margarine to warm tap water before, and the bread has turned out fine. If you are using the Rapid Cycle the temperature of the fat becomes more important than for the Basic Cycle or longer cycles.
The Order In Which Ingredients Should Be Added to the Bread Machine
There is a big mystique about the order in which ingredients should be added to a bread machine. The truth is, if you are going to mix and bake the dough right away then it really doesn’t matter which order you add the ingredients. The machine will mix them all up regardless of the order they were added to the bread bucket. If you want to program the machine with the Delay Cycle to start while you are away, then the order becomes very important. The ingredients must be added in a way that will keep them inert until the machine begins it’s mixing. Therefore it is a good idea to get in the habit of adding the ingredients in this way from the beginning.
Most machines like it best if you put the liquid ingredients in first. This would include water, eggs, milk, honey, buttermilk, fats and extracts. Put the liquids into the machine first. Next add the flour. As you are adding the flour, urge it out overtop of the water so that that it sort of seals the water in. Then you can add the other dry ingredients like salt, sugar, dry milk powder and seasonings. The last thing you should add is the yeast. Most recipes suggest that you make a shallow indentation or well in the center of the flour and sprinkle the yeast into it. This is important because it prevents the yeast from coming into contact with the liquid until the machine begins mixing. If the yeast and liquid get together before the machine is scheduled to begin, then the yeast will become active and likely make a big mess out of the machine. I have never seen this happen, but my imagination is pretty vivid, and I try to avoid it. For quick reference, here is the order in which the ingredients should be added:
1. Liquid ingredients (water, eggs, milk, fat, honey)
2. Flour, to “seal” in the liquid
3. Other dry ingredients (dry milk, salt, sugar, seasonings)
4. Add the yeast last.
To sum it up, if you are going to mix and bake your bread right away, then add the ingredients in any order you please. If you are going to use the delay cycle to program the bread machine to work while you are away, then add them in the order given above.
