i30 Owners Club
GENERAL STUFF => GENERAL DISCUSSIONS => Random Chit Chat => Topic started by: AlanHo on August 21, 2020, 14:19:53
-
17 Years ago when I was carer for my terminally ill ex-wife I found it difficult to leave the house for more than a few minutes. Hence I had all our groceries delivered by the supermarket – home deliveries were relatively new then and it was all a bit hit and miss.
I found it difficult to buy bread that I liked – most of the commercial stuff is heavy, loaded with chemicals and too moist. In fact you could cut the crust off a sllce of white bread, crunch it up in your hand, and water would ooze out – leaving you with a handful of dough.
So I bought a top-of-the range Panasonic breadmaker with a retractable paddle that cost, in those days, almost £300.
5 years later I met Libby, 12 months to the very day later we got married and a year later I sold up and we moved house. I continued to use the breadmaker with great success, but there was a small local bakery that sold excellent bread and the breadmaker soon became redundant. The only thing I missed was the aroma of hot fresh cooked bread first thing in the morning which had been baked on a timer overnight. I eventually sold it on Ebay.
When we moved house last October the bakery was no longer local, it was 5 miles away and we found ourselves buying supermarket bread. I kept intending to buy another breadmaker, but we were so busy getting the new house and garden sorted it was April this year when I got round to it. But by then we were on lockdown, strong bread flour and yeast were as rare as hen’s teeth and noone had any stock of breadmakers.
Three weeks ago I noticed that strong flour and yeast were freely available, so I looked around for a suitable breadmaker. I had intended buying another Panasonic costing £235 – but Which and other reviews all spoke highly of the Russell Hobbs Fast Bake machine which Argos were selling for £65. Technically there was little difference between them if all you wanted to make was plain white and Wholemeal bread. I would be unlikely to use the extra features offered by the Panasonic, hence I bought the Russell Hobbs.
I’m glad I did – it is the equal of my old Panasonic and cooks a standard white loaf to perfection in just over 3 hours.
We met up with some friends yesterday and Libby was telling them I am a master baker - it appears they already suspected that. :snigger:
This is today’s, which was cooked in the early hours ready for my breakfast toast.
(https://i.imgur.com/EVJJ98x.jpg)
-
We had a splendid bread maker when I was a kid, I called her Mother. The war was just ending and there was ofter power cuts and one of my fond BREAD memories is laying in front of the coal fire in the semi dark by candlelight looking at the bread dough put there to rise.
EEEeeee it wer grand when I were a kid <not>
-
My kitchen is filled with the latest gadgets but that's one gadget I've never owned.
I love the smell of freshly baked bread, I do, me.
-
Love fresh baked bread wafting through the house :goodjob2:
We used to have the Panasonic multi function one which made beautiful loaves, you couldn't help yourself and had to have some...till we all put on weight after spending a fortune making bread all the time :snigger: sold it quite quickly after that.
I stick to my favourite Stone Baked Sourdough now from the local bakery, which is great! though I do miss the smell of home baked.
-
I tried to find a funny bit of Jimmy Carr stand up where he takes the pi$$ out of bread makers. Quite hilarious. Unfortunately I couldn't find it.
Mum and Dad used to have the Panasonic and at the time i think it was one of the first and probably the best. My first wife and I had a Breville for a while which worked reasonably well.
I do love the smells and quite like most of the breads but we are not big bread people these days (limit our carbs) and they certainly aren't cost effective especially when we enjoy a multigrain loaf from our independent grocer that is only $2.15 a loaf.
-
Love my breadmaker (Panasonic SD-01). As someone who at one point in time was an apprentice at Bakers Delight I missed the bread straight outta the oven. Happily making lush loaves every 2 days - easy peasy
-
Love fresh baked bread wafting through the house :goodjob2:
We used to have the Panasonic multi function one which made beautiful loaves, you couldn't help yourself and had to have some...till we all put on weight after spending a fortune making bread all the time :snigger: sold it quite quickly after that.
I stick to my favourite Stone Baked Sourdough now from the local bakery, which is great! though I do miss the smell of home baked.
What Craig said. When we lived in Canada it was impossible to buy bread that tasted like and had the consistency of bread. I suspect it contained so much sugar that in some places it might be considered confectionery. So a bread machine was acquired and we made our own until it was obvious that we were carb overloading and getting waisted.
Sadly the bread machine was retired as a result.
-
Waisted.. very clever. I'm eating more bread lately but fortunately with all my walking, other indoor activities and my PD I'm managing to keep the weight off. :happydance: