Artisan Bread from your Bread Machine

Let a professional baker show you how to use your bread machine to make a variety of excellent artisan breads at home

When teaching at Bread Ahead, Manuel noticed that many enthusiastic home bakers would sheepishly admit to using a bread machine at home, expecting to be frowned upon by a ‘real’ baker. But, as Manuel points out, a bread machine will make only the bread you enable it to make; sub-standard ingredients and quick, over-yeasted fermentation can only ever produce a less than exceptional loaf.

But if you use your bread machine differently, respecting the basic principles of artisan baking, then your bread machine will deliver fantastic results. Let Manuel show you how to use your bread machine to produce awesome, guilt-free breads you can be proud of.

Manuel also shows you how to use your slow cooker to help with your bread-making to produce even better results.

First though, he shares the basic principles of artisan baking: understanding fermentation; the need to knead; the importance of proving; finally, shaping; and how to get the best bake for a perfect loaf. Recipes are arranged in four sections: enriched doughs for the morning; our daily bread; more advanced breads; the baker’s unlikely ally – the slow cooker.

Recipes included a basic pain de mie for a sandwich loaf; challah; granary; ciabatta; blue-cheese-and-walnut bread sourdough; pumpernickel; and spelt.