Customer Reviews

Rustic European Breads from Your Bread Machine

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

If you are looking for a great bread machine book, this may be the one for you!

I made the basic french bread that bakes in the machine and it was wonderful - far and away the best bread to come out of my bread machine EVER!

They gave a lot of great suggestions and ideas to try to improve the quality of the bread you make in your bread machine. Some of the suggestions (such as using spring water) may not be for everyone, but there are a lot of good ideas.

Many of the recipes do require baking in your oven rather than in the machine. Also, a good number of the recipes require you to make a starter (not all of them), so this wouldn't be my one and only bread machine book.

If you love the good crusty breads, but don't always have the time to make the dough, try this book and let your bread machine do the work. You won't be disappointed.

If you buy this book you will use it all the time. Ours lives next to the bread machine, because there's just no point in walking across the kitchen with it. Clear instructions and helpful tips are given on how to make hundreds of yummy breads using your bread machine, or your bread machine and oven. Those of you without baking stones might want to pick one up (I just sent someone this book and a stone--both purchased right on this site!--for a gift) because you can get superb round loaves with the stone. Here at our house there is always foccaccia, and usually one of the great breads made with a starter (like Levain or Whole-Wheat Walnut). Don't want to fuss with your stone? Brother Juniper's Santa Rosa Struan is excellent, and the best peanut-butter and jelly sandwiches in the world can be made on their recipe for Whole Meal Bread which is made with yogurt and cinnamon for a touch of sweetness. We eat the Mangone Family thin-crust pizza once a week, and the Deep Dish pizza with a Durum Wheat crust is a pizzeria-style impress the kids favorite. Is your mouth watering yet?

Whenever I make bread from this book for dinner parties people always ask me where I bought it. Is there a more convincing reason to dust off your bread machine and try again?

The recipes in this book are great! I discovered this book two years ago shortly after purchasing my bread machine. I was discouraged with the recipes in the manual so I was thrilled when I tried the recipes in this book. My family loves all the different breads that I bring to the family gatherings. I have tried the baquettes -- a favorite, challah, wheat bread, french bread italian, and many more. Everyone loves all of them! I recently purchased this book as a gift for an upcoming birthday. Three relatives purchased this book based upon my comments a few years ago. Enjoy!

I'm glad I got the book, if only to learn about using the dough cycle on my bread machine. Many of the breads are as fabulous as described and taste great. They can still be a little too finely textured, however, without the big holes that the cover picture and the descriptions would lead you to believe will happen. The pan ordinaire baguettes came out more like Italian bread the first time I made them. So I still had to play around with the dough a bit to get them to turn out exactly as described. In many cases, the dough actually has to be wetter than the recipe would indicate in order to get them to come up to expectations.

To my mind, the basic bread flour breads are the best recipes in the book. When the authors get into other flours and flavors (rye, etc.), the results were less appealing.

I also think the authors go overboard continuously suggesting organic flour and bottled water. Most of us won't go to this bother, and it seems gratuitous on their part to insist that they're really that much better.

This is a book for the breadmaker machine owner who wants to branch out a little and try something different. The techniques and ingredients section alone (the first 87 pages) is worth the price of the book (speaking as a novice breadmaker). The results of the recipes I have tried have been outstanding. After I made the Pao Doce bread (p. 288), my husband commented that it looked so beautiful, he would have bought it immediately if he had seen it in a bakery. It tasted just as good and was simple to make. Many of the recipes call for using homemade starter--something that I had always thought must be difficult but that turns out to be as easy as throwing a few ingredients in the breadmaker and letting them sit overnight. Highly recommended.

When you have exhausted all bread machine recipes, you get bored with the same kind of bread and eventually stop making bread... Well, if that is what's happening to you, try any recipe in this book!

I tried several recipes from this book, and they all came out like pro's. Rustic, chewy, and unlike many bread-machine breads, my bread tasted very good even after a few days. The recipes are quite simple, but it is more than measuring ingredients and pressing button. Still, even for a complete beginner (I just got my first machine a couple weeks ago), he/she can enjoy the process and the outcome!

Hightly recommended for any level of bakers.

After using my bread machine extensively for several years, the novelty of fresh hot bread had sort of worn off (imagine that). After visiting Europe, I really wanted to be able to eat the types of breads I ate there, but didn't know how to make them and didn't want to pay the high price here for specialty breads. This book is fun, informative, and has great recipes. If some of the other reviews that mention time and complexity scare you, you should realize that there the recipes in this book vary in complexity from extremely simple to complicated and that you should decide which recipes to make accordingly. Lastly, like all recipes, a certain amount of experimentation/variation may be needed to suit your needs; the authors teach you how to do it exactly right, but a little cheating will still yield awesome bread.

Bread machines rule. But let's face it, after a few loaves you realize the thing basically makes a similar loaf almost every time. There are recipes to let the machine do everything. But you will want to be a better baker, and that is where this book shines.

The pattern of the recipes are: make a starter or "sponge" using the Dough cycle. Let the starter sit 2 hour to 3-5 days. (Yes there is a sourdough recipe). Process the dough again in the machine on the Dough setting, then shape the dough and bake in your oven on your stone. Really, this is the best way to make really good bread, unique bread, all the time.

The book covers everything you need to know to make bread at home. This is from the water to use to the different types of flour, to the equipment, to recipes just for starter doughs.

So what bugs me about the book? The authors include an excellent section on preparing starters. But many of the recipes have their own starter included. They don't give you alternate ingredient volumes to use if you have a starter from a previous batch of bread. Also, there aren't very many differnt types of easier whole wheat breads. The book focuses on variety but I would have preferred focusing on several types of breads that don't need exotic shapes or equipment.

A great book for understanding the fundamentals of bread. As a novice baker, I found it easy to follow and was impressed with my results. The list of resources at the back of the book is very helpful (where to find stone-ground, natural flour etc.). And all this with my bread machine!

I've made quite a few of the breads in this book and everything has come out to rave reviews from whoever I serve the results to. From the basic French bread to the Brother Juniper's Santa Rosa Struan, to Challah, to bread sticks--just great! The authors also explain a lot of the "why's" of ingredients and actions you take in bread making. (Such as exactly what "spritzing" a loaf in the oven with water will do to it & why.) This book, my Breadman & my "stone" are all I need....