Photobucket

Tackling homemade bread is a topic that sends any reasonable homemaker running for the hills.

I mean seriously, why would one spend hours mixing, kneading, rising, shaping, and baking when she can go to the store and purchase a loaf for next to nothing?

Forget the hours when your house smells  like a slice of heaven, or that the  family will crown you the next “Domestic Goddess of the Year. ”

It’s just a delicious hassle…unless you have one of these.

Photobucket

You could spend an entire day walking through our house and I guarantee that there would be only a handful of items that I purchased retail from a real or online store…and yes, this would be one of them.

It was an investment. An expensive investment, and one that I never regret.

Fourteen years ago, when I moved from WI to NC,  I was terribly homesick and my monthly phone bill was racking up.

In the midst of a really “natural” cooking period, I wanted to make this purchase but couldn’t justify adding it to our monthly expenses.

I decided that for every dollar I could save from my monthly phone bill, I would put it towards my industrial strength kitchen machine purchase (Magic Mill DLX).I only had two small children at the time, but I guess I was planning ahead.

I nearly went cold turkey on my phone bills, and purchased my mixer four months later. I do have a Kitchen Aid, which makes two loaves of dough, but this will mix and kneed up to eight loaves of bread at one time. I still have to shape it, and form it into loaves, but this does all the kneading.

The result? A machine that gives me the “appearance” of a professional since I am not nearly in enough arm shape to kneed that much dough by hand :).

Yes, there are still learning curves to making homemade bread, but it is so worth the effort.

Magic Mill DLX

Hmm – one of these loaves is not like the other…

(Don’t let them over rise 🙂 )

recipes,whole wheat bread

Whole Wheat Bread Recipe using Evaporated Milk

whole wheat bread

I tried a new recipe after cleaning out the pantry and finding some expired evaporated milk. Not wanting it to go to waste,  I thought I would give it a try.

It was delicious, although the added expensive of evaporated milk offsets my desire to make it again (unless I would find a deal on it).

I’m posting the evaporated milk recipe, and will post my traditional one later.

 

 

Did you miss my Baking Day Plan?

Look what else I have gotten done today during my Baking Day update.