Does the bread maker save your family budget?

Frugalsod

I use a Kenwood Chef. It cost a lot but then I use it most days and I reckon that it has paid for itself in 18 months with the changes I have made. I would save about £1.20 a loaf when bread was £1.60 but as it has come down closer to a £1 I still save a money but I am not counting cooking.

Though you get very fresh bread without any additives or preservatives for very little. This was my main reason for getting the Kenwood Chef, though I did fork out for decent bread tins as well.

Like others I also make pizza dough and if you do these yourself then you can save a fortune over delivered and ready made varieties. This is where the big savings can be made.

omendata

Yellow ticket might at Asda - cant beat 10p a loaf!

mumofthetwins

ive got loads of flour in but haven't used my BM in ages ..
going to start tonight !!
anyone know any good recipies .. and im thinking about making HM pizza later in the week .. is it worth using the BM for the dough ?


Lisa x

shellsmithcat

Another wholemeal cooked in my Panasonic yesterday. Trying not to buy bread anymore. Homemade tastes much nicer and way cheaper than shop brought. Probably about 60p a loaf.

londonTiger

IrishWasherWoman wrote: »

I would definately advocate a breadmaker.
For one thing the bread is really fresh.
For another, mine only has 1tsp of salt and 1tsp of sugar per 1.5lb or 2lb loaf - I believe shop bought loaves can have as much as 6 or 7 tsp of hidden sugar in them.
The other great thing is that I can grab and measure the ingredients really fast, turn it on, and go off and do other things for 3hrs or so, or longer if I put the delay timer on. It usually takes abut 10 mins to put the ingredients in the pan, but I CAN do it in 6 mins, if I'm on a roll! (Pardon the pun.)
It's so quick and easy, you need never run out of bread again, especially as there are super rapid programmes which will make a less perfect, but still acceptable loaf in 1 hr, and anyway, there's no excuse not to freeze a couple to get out in a hurry.

bread is all sugar.. no point crying over 1tsp or 2tsp.

The flour gets converted to simple sugars by the body very quickly.

The bread makers have such econoies of scale, they can probably sell you a loaf at equal or cheaper price than what you'd pay for your raw ingredients.

I take your point about the bread smell. I have been carb free for 3 months and walking past the bakery isle makes me feel like an ex alcoholic walking past a brewery.

londonTiger

the nutrition info on the bread is going to have it of its cooked form.

The sugar on the label is not added sugar but the sugar that is produced from cooking the flour.

White bread has a very high glycaemic index of 95, glucose is 100.

Your own bread isn't much different, you are probably only adding 1 tsp of sugar but the flour is being converted to sugary carbs.

Justamum

londonTiger wrote: »

bread is all sugar.. no point crying over 1tsp or 2tsp.

The flour gets converted to simple sugars by the body very quickly.

The bread makers have such econoies of scale, they can probably sell you a loaf at equal or cheaper price than what you'd pay for your raw ingredients.

I take your point about the bread smell. I have been carb free for 3 months and walking past the bakery isle makes me feel like an ex alcoholic walking past a brewery.

Your body converts food to simple sugars because glucose is the fuel your body needs, otherwise it wouldn't convert it. Being 'carb free' is starving your body of fuel.

Goldiegirl

not worried about sugar or carbs


I need my food to be low in sodium. So I use my bread maker to make low sodium bread or pizza bases. I use 'lo salt' instead of normal salt.

Justamum

Goldiegirl wrote: »

not worried about sugar or carbs


I need my food to be low in sodium. So I use my bread maker to make low sodium bread or pizza bases. I use 'lo salt' instead of normal salt.

I've reduced the salt in my bread to half what a recipe usually calls for. I did it gradually - 1 gram every time I made bread - so that it didn't come as a shock to the family :rotfl: I don't add sugar to the dough though. It's supposed to be food for the yeast to help it grow, but I don't have that problem in my kitchen! Even if I halve the amount of yeast I'm still beating the beast back down into the bowl!

londonTiger

Justamum wrote: »

Your body converts food to simple sugars because glucose is the fuel your body needs, otherwise it wouldn't convert it. Being 'carb free' is starving your body of fuel.

then I am a ghost because I have not had any "fuel" for 2 months.

You are quite right all carbs get turned into a simple sugars so worry about added sugar is silly, because it's all sugar.

If you go carb free the body just adapts to using fat as energy and adapts to burning the body's fat to use as energy.

Being carb free is great. I am watching my love handles dissapear like magic and I have very even and constant energy levels, no sugar crashes or fatigue because fat is much more flexible form of energy, the body can make ketones from fat stores as and when it needs it.