Daily bread

Baking your own bread seems to me to be at the heart of a thrifty kitchen - there's always something wholesome to eat, expensive ingredients can be stretched further, there are myriad delicious dishes to cook with any stale slices and crumbs. To simplify daily baking, I've been using a bread machine for over a year for the majority of our dough (I haven't bought a loaf of bread since 2007). And now I'm experimenting with the kind of dough you mix up once a week and pull off pieces to bake.

I've just spent five minutes measuring water, dried yeast, salt, flour into a huge plastic box. The resulting shaggy mess - enough for four loaves - is sitting on the kitchen table, and later this morning will go into the fridge, where it will stay until I'm ready to bake the first loaf this evening: by then it will have magically transformed itself into dough. That's it: no kneading, no fiddling with little cups of yeast foaming in warm water, no fuss. The proof, of course, will be in the baking. Watch this space.

Things to do with stale or leftover bread

Panzanilla
Herb stuffing for roast chicken
Grilled trout with rosemary stuffing
Baked scallops
Anchovy toasts

Related posts

Six seed rolls
Bread knots - another simple way to make beautiful and delicious rolls, using this dough, or your default dough

Yeast starter for bread - and the bread make your own sourdough starter

No-knead bread the famous NY Times recipe
Speeded-up no-knead bread and a different take on it

Yoghurt bread fabulous, easy, TRY IT
Quick oat loaf
Spelt bread - it's getting easier to buy this highly-flavoured flour


Anti-oxidant tea bread - I made this for my husband for a pre-surgery boost - delicious, too!

Yeast conversion - fresh/dried/quick

Links to the best blogging bakers I know

Tanna at My Kitchen in Half Cups
A Year in Bread
Susan at Farmgirl Fare

this list is not exhaustive, there are dozens of wonderful blogging bakers