Bread Making

[lemonD]

I've a had quick look for a 800g/large loaf tin, is it better to get a quality tin or just a cheap and cheerful one?

LD

[Gordon]

I bough mine from Lakelands they do a silicon one @ about £15 - £16 ish and the metal, non stick, ones are around the fiver mark hope this helps

PS

I floowed Jennys recomendation and got some improver things are much better now, although I think I still have someway to go, I suspect I'm under kneeding it.

[jenny_haddow]

If you have TK Max nearby check them out for tins. I bought an enormous bread tin by Dr Oetker(sp?) for about £7.50 it would easily do an 800gram loaf. It's a good heavy gauge tin too.

I've also made earthenware loaf pots to suit (I have a kiln etc as I teach art), and they work very well once they have seasoned.

[johnfb]

I bought a large loaf tin, that will take a 2lb loaf, last week in TK Max in Dublin for €5, which works out about £3.90

Great value!

[jenny_haddow]

Here's some more bread. Rolls this time, made from 50/50 home ground wheat and shop bought strong white. I sieved the home ground to remove most of the bran and the result is a nice textured roll for tonight's barbecue, which includes Oddley's excellent burger recipe.

I'm glad some of you are finding the bread enhancer useful. I've only been using it this last year, but I buy it by the kilo and store it in the fridge. For me that lasts about 6 months, which is its shelf life.

Jen

[saucisson]

I've just ordered some farmhouse improver and some soft bread improver and a silicon bread tin (@ �7.40 for the tin) from the site Jen recommended.
And a nonstick tin with free improver and yeast sample from the one Oddley recommended .
Dave

[Spuddy]

Did you use the enhancer with your home ground flour loaf and rolls Jen?

[jenny_haddow]

Yes I did Spuddy, 20 grams to 500grams of flour. While it is an added cost you don't have anything else other that a teaspoon of salt and water.

Dave, I hope you are pleased with the results you get.

Jen

[lemonD]

Jen,
I have the Farmhouse improver from Kitchen Foods, their recipe calls for 1-2 tsp per 500g white flour, a teaspoon averages out at 2g.
I'm going to use Asda strong bread flour how much do you use for that type of flour?

LD

[johnfb]

I have a question on the improver.
I only make bread about once a week as we dont eat a lot of it in my house. Usually 1 large loaf or 8 rolls.

If I bought the improver how long would it last before going off?
And is it worth it for such small amounts of bread making?
BTW, I dont use a bread maker just the old fashioned way by hand.

John

[jenny_haddow]

Hi John

The shelf life is six months I was told by the supplier, so a 200 gram batch would last you a fair time I would think. I made the bread rolls by hand, well Kenwood really, using fresh yeast free from Tesco(they gave me a 6oz lump)

LD I would go along with Kitchen Foods recommendation. I tend to use malted wholemeal improver and 20 grams is the suggested dose. The farmhouse loaf I made in the photo I used farmhouse improver, cant remember how much though. Wholemeal flour probably needs a bit more of a lift.

Jen

I've just gone back and looked and notice I put 20 grams of improver for the farmhouse. Probably habit, I could have got away with less. I'm wondering now if the 20 grams I have on the instruction leaflet is a typing error, so I shall contact the supplier about it, thanks for drawing my attention to that LD

[Batman]

I've bought some improver based on the recommendations here.

Like Jen I normally bake a 50:50 (wholemeal:strong white) loaf in a Panasonic breadmaker. Without the improver, the loaf texture is pretty good and suits me but not my son who prefers 'fresh air' white bread. I've found that the improver did help with increasing volume and opening the texture but I need to down adjust the addition as I'm finding it a little too open and I can't spread butter easily! Not tried it on my son yet.

[Kitchen Foods]

Hi Everyone,
This is Emma from Kitchen Foods, I thought I would join the forums after couple of you mentioned the breadmaking threads and have recently bought from me.
I thought it would be a good idea after reading the posts and thinking, I bet many of you would like to ask questions about breadmaking and improvers etc, so here I am!!!
To give you all our background, Kitchen Foods is proud to be the first company to start supplying bread improvers and general proffesional baking supplies to the domestic marketplace, since then others have copied but never caught up! we have built up a good reputation for quality and satisfaction, I am the owner but also I'm a housewife, mother, home baker and general dogsbody!!!
All our ingredients come from very high quality manufacturer that believes in quality not cheapness, they supply the same ingredients I sell to some very famous high street brands including Greggs the Bakers.

I'll try to read all the posts and reply where needed, but in the meantime if anyone has any questions please fire away!!! I'll try to help wherever I can.

[saucisson]

Welcome to the forums Emma!

Dave

[Kitchen Foods]

Hi John

The shelf life is six months I was told by the supplier, so a 200 gram batch would last you a fair time I would think. I made the bread rolls by hand, well Kenwood really, using fresh yeast free from Tesco(they gave me a 6oz lump)

LD I would go along with Kitchen Foods recommendation. I tend to use malted wholemeal improver and 20 grams is the suggested dose. The farmhouse loaf I made in the photo I used farmhouse improver, cant remember how much though. Wholemeal flour probably needs a bit more of a lift.

Jen

I've just gone back and looked and notice I put 20 grams of improver for the farmhouse. Probably habit, I could have got away with less. I'm wondering now if the 20 grams I have on the instruction leaflet is a typing error, so I shall contact the supplier about it, thanks for drawing my attention to that LD

Hi Jen
The farmhouse improver should be 1% or so of the flour weight, so 500g flour needs 5g of improver or roughly a teaspoon for ease of measurement. Wholemeal will require about 2 tsp.
The Malted wholemeal improver is 4% so about 20gms per 500g of flour, this is because it has malted flour in it and it cannot be concentrated.
Hope this helps
Emma x