Bread Machines For Dummies (4 page)
Read Bread Machines For Dummies Online
Authors: Glenna Vance,Tom Lacalamita
Basic common sense: The more convenient the place is that you keep your bread machine, the more you'll use it. So find a convenient place to keep it. Remember, we want convenience. Bread machines are all about convenience. Don't defeat your purpose by putting the machine on some out-of-the-way shelf, which you have to drag it down from every time you use it.
Stock your pantry and freezer with the basic ingredients: flour, salt, sugar, salad oil, and yeast. Even add a few bread mixes for the time-crunch emergency.
You are starting out on the right path toward your target â homemade bread forever!
You can make White Sandwich Bread, Rye Bread, Egg Bread, French Bread, Hearty Whole Grain Breads â it's your choice and we've supplied many recipes for your choosing. You can even get some of these done in an hour. We've provided a whole chapter with recipes that are especially good when done on the Super Fast cycle.
If it's quick breads that you prefer there are two chapters with nothing but quick breads. Remember how good Banana Bread is with cream cheese? We add lemon juice and grated lemon peel; umm, is it good. If you have zucchini-a-plenty in the fall, you will find our Zucchini Bread recipe to be just what you're looking for.
Wait 'til you experience the Dough cycle and find out how easy it is to make pizza, or sweet rolls, or French baguettes, or coffeecakes. The process is so clean. If you've ever made bread the traditional method, you'll never go back. Not only is the process so unencumbered, there is so little to clean up afterward.
Those grandmothers we mentioned earlier in the chapter rave about the ease of the process. Actually, grandmothers like to use the Dough cycle on the bread machines because often they don't have the strength or endurance to knead the dough, but they still get so much satisfaction from providing dinner rolls at the family gatherings. You can actually use the Dough cycle to knead and rise your family's traditional recipes. If your recipe is too large, you may have to cut it in half.
We've even provided many special, ethnic breads for festive occasions. You may discover one or two from your ethnic background that you haven't had since childhood. Using a bread machine can become a way of life â imagine healthy, nutritious breads at every meal.
Breads for a Healthy Diet
In This Chapter
Eating bread to make a healthier you
Understanding the value of bread ingredients
Creating the most nutritious breads
Accentuating your menus with bread
T
o eat, or not to eat, bread is a common dietary question these days â especially when we hear statistics about how overweight our population is. Popular magazines for women carry at least one article per issue on weight loss. Some theories tout the value of high-protein diets, while others say that we should eliminate sugar or fat.
Those of us who enjoy eating bread may wish that we could increase its protein content or eliminate the sugar and fat. In this chapter, we explain the role of bread in your diet. When you understand that the primary nutritional purpose of bread is to provide your body with fiber, you realize that although you can add some protein to your bread recipes, the primary purpose of bread is not to be a source of protein. And when you realize that the fat in bread is essential for your body's good health, maybe you won't be so quick to try to eliminate it from all your bread recipes.
Because breads are a very important part of your diet, we also offer loads of ideas for making them an exciting part of your menus. Besides the usual added touch to meals, breads can wrap your entrées, hold your sandwich ingredients, soak up your stews, garnish your casseroles, accent your salads, accompany your breakfasts, enhance your hors d'oeuvres, and be a great nibbling snack. By the time you finish this chapter, you should be convinced that bread is good for you and be filled with ideas and inspiration for making your own bread in your bread machine.
Synergistic
is the perfect adjective for bread. Synergistic means having the ability to enhance the effectiveness of an already active agent so that the total effect is greater than the sum of the individual parts. Bread is synergistic because the vitamins, minerals, and proteins in other foods are more readily absorbed when those foods are eaten with bread. In this section, we explain how the fiber and fat found in bread help your body to function properly.
The fiber in bread slows the passage of food through the digestive system by holding water and creating bulk. The nutrients are then more completely absorbed. When you eat a slice of bread or a roll with a salad, the raw vegetables or fruit remain in your stomach longer, and your body extracts a higher ratio of vitamins from the food before it is digested. Therefore, bread and salad eaten together have more value to the body than when eaten separately.
The synergism from bread combined with other food continues throughout the digestive tract, allowing carbohydrates to move into the bloodstream at a steady rate. People with diabetes and hypoglycemia find eating bread especially important because it keeps the blood sugar from rising high after a meal and then dropping.
Bread supplies vitamin B and complex carbohydrates, but supplying fiber is its most important function. Many people want to eliminate the white flour found in bread because they have read so much about the value of eating whole grains. Although it's true that whole grain flours contain more insoluble fiber than refined flour, white flours do have some advantages. White flour is milled from the
endosperm
of the grain, which contains the greatest share of protein, carbohydrates, iron, major B vitamins, and soluble fiber.
In the digestive tract, soluble fiber binds with
bile acids
(raw materials from which cholesterol is made) and prevents their absorption into the blood. The result is lower cholesterol. Insoluble fiber, which is found in whole grains, helps to move
carcinogens
(cancer-causing substances) quickly through the body. Fortunately, bread is a food that not only tastes good, but also is good for a healthy diet and lifestyle.
The claim that bread is fattening is a big, fat myth. The truth is that bread is low in fat and high in long-term energy. On average, one slice of bread has only 1 gram of fat and 75 calories, the majority of which come from complex carbohydrates. As the body's preferred source of fuel, complex carbohydrates contain four calories per gram, compared to fat with nine.
This is not to say that all fat is bad for you, because fat in the diet is absolutely necessary. But not just any fat. The best fats come from natural vegetable oils because they break down during digestion into essential fatty acids, which the body requires to maintain good health. However, vegetable oils that have been hydrogenated, such as margarines and solid shortenings, add only calories and cannot be utilized by the body. So nutritionally speaking, vegetable oils are the best for you, followed by butter.
When you add seeds, such as sunflower or sesame, to recipes, you add the good kind of fat to your bread, because these seeds fall in the category of vegetable fats. (Plus they make bread taste
sooo
good.) Seeds furnish fat, fiber, and flavor. Likewise, adding cracked wheat, wheat germ, or wheat bran brings fat, fiber, and flavor to bread.
You will want to discover the breads your family enjoys the most. As with every presentation, be it a speech or food for the table, you have to analyze your audience. So, in thinking about using your bread machine to the best advantage, you have to ask yourself, “Who will be eating my bread?”
We have fed our share of young mouths and know they prefer soft and white. If your eaters are primarily children, we'll bet that you will be repeating Good Old American Sandwich Bread several times a week. You can vary their options with Buttermilk Farm Bread and Irish Potato Bread because they are similar in mouth feel. Oh, but wait a minute. What do you think they'll think about the Peanut Butter & Jelly Bread? We can assure you, that will be a keeper in your recipe repertoire for kids of all ages. Little people usually do not like whole grain breads. And that's okay because they primarily eat breads for the complex carbohydrates to give them energy. But if it's fiber you would like them to have, try the Light Wheat Bread or the Buttermilk Oatmeal Bread. Both of these breads offer fiber and yet feel soft in the mouth.
Whether you are a child or a grown-up, you'll find Buttermilk Oatmeal Bread also makes a wonderful breakfast toast. What a healthy way to start a morningâ orange juice, an egg or bowl of cereal, and a toasted slice of Buttermilk Oatmeal Bread. Or for a healthy adult breakfast “on the run,” try the Five-Grain Bread toasted and spread with a bit of light cream cheese. If you're a muffin stuffer, you'll want to experiment with the muffin mix breads. By using your favorite muffin mix you can make wonderful breakfast breads. Another idea, perhaps best saved for a weekend morning, is French toast made with the leftover Egg Bread.
That is if you can ever have any leftover Egg Bread. Besides serving it with a variety of entrees, you'll also find it is delicious as a sandwich bread. Or, you can make a great sandwich for salami, meatloaf, or other sandwich meat with Beer Rye Bread. Some people like to slice Focaccia to use for sandwiches; it works but we usually serve it by breaking off pieces to accompany soups or salads. We've also included the recipe and directions for Bread Bowls that are popular for serving soups and salads.
If you like to sop your soup or stew, here are some other suggestions: Mushroom Onion, Spaghetti Bread, Chili Bread, and Onion Dill Bread.
We like Onion Dill Bread because it is so versatile. The taste goes well with soups, salads, casseroles, and so on, and it serves as an excellent base bread for small party sandwiches. Also, we often use a variety of quick breads as hors d'oeuvres for a cocktail party, or a bridal or baby shower.
Are you taking bread from your bread machine with you to your workplace to share with fellow employees? You will want to look through the two chapters of quick bread recipes. We are confident that any of them would be a hit. In fact, because they are so quick and easy to make, you'd better take more than one at a time.
Quick breads are also great as desserts. For example, you will find a slice of Pumpkin or Orange Date bread and a dish of canned fruit make a light yet satisfying closure to an evening meal. And for special days, we have included two chapters of Holiday and Ethnic Breads. It is our intent to inspire you to keep your bread machine a hummin' and you and yours enjoyin' the best bread you ever ate.