We are taking baby steps over here to cut processed foods and preservatives from our vocabulary.  We haven’t started a chicken farm yet, and don’t own any goats or cows, but I’m trying to identify simple things that I can do to reduce our dependence on grocery store supply chains and  ingredients in our foods that I can’t pronounce.

Along those lines, I’ve found 100 Days of Real Food to be an inspiring website.  I’m not feeling as ambitious as her yet, but have appreciated some of her tips and recipes to taking the small steps towards processed-free foods.  One take-away I got from her was the idea of returning to the good old-fashioned bread machine.  I think when bread machines first came out, people appreciated them for the creative freedom they offered to experiment with yummy, homemade bread without all the sweat equity that traditionally went into it.  Recently we’ve also started to recognize the health benefits.  With only five minutes of preparation, you end up with complete control over the ingredients going into your bread.  I mean, I can pronounce the words flour, yeast, salt and water.  So, when my boys bite into a piece of bread with only those ingredients in it, I can feel good about what’s going into their bodies.

So, I recently borrowed my mother-in-law’s bread machine to see if our family could benefit from it.  So far, so good.  And, yes, we’re even using it for our sandwich bread.  Pretty much at any given point in the day, that machine is on our counter making bread.  My mother-in-law’s machine hasn’t seen this level of activity in many years, so A.T. is expecting it to have a complete meltdown soon, but I’m more optimistic than that.

When deciding what things to make myself verses buy at the store, I ask myself whether it’s sustainable.  Five boys eat a lot of food, and my time is spread pretty thin between my business and family activities.  There are some things that simply aren’t worth my time.  To me, bread made in the bread machine is worth it.  It’s literally five minutes of my time to dump four ingredients into a pan, stick it into a bread machine, and hit the start button.  Three hours later, I have a loaf of bread, and all for a cost of under $1 per loaf!

So, for the fun of it, I’m sharing two of my bread recipes here–scroll to the bottom for the printable version.  The loaves that I make with this recipe come in just under two pounds, though I think technically my bread machine only makes one-pound loaves.  I tweaked these recipes to get the largest loaf I could get without it overflowing the pan.  One loaf this size is devoured in one meal at our house, but if you have a smaller family, just remember to refrigerate leftovers–there are no preservatives in this bread, so mold will show up quicker than you think.  Also, make loaves ahead of time and freeze till you’re ready for them, they freeze well.

Regular Whole Wheat Bread for the Bread Machine

• 3 1/4 cups whole wheat flour, white flour, or combination of half of each
• 1/2 T kosher salt
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1 tsp yeast

Add ingredients to your bread machine in this order.  Bake according to your bread machine’s instructions.  For my machine, it means just closing the lid, pressing the bread button and then the start button.  Three hours later, I have a loaf of bread that looks like this:

German Rye Bread for the Bread Machine (adapted from my sister’s recipe here)

• 3 cups whole wheat flour, white flour, or half of each
• 1/4 cups of rye flour
• 1/2 T kosher salt
• 1 T molasses
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1 tsp yeast

Add ingredients to bread machine in this order.  Bake according to your bread machine’s instructions.

By the way, a slice of this bread is delectable with some Nutella spread on top!

Here’s a printable version of both recipes, as usual, made to fit in my oilcloth mini binders!  Enjoy!

bread machine recipes