Can’t Buy it? Bake it!

Easy Homemade Bread & Baking Resources

Not surprisingly, during this time of stocking up (and let’s be honest, flat-out panic buying), many of the items we take for granted are just not available on store shelves. Chief among them, bread…and bread is an important staple for many, most especially when the kids are all home and looking for lunches!

If you can bake your own bread, though, that dearth is less of an issue for you. And this looks like a good time to revive or to learn a new old trick or two, to better situate yourself to deal with not only this crisis, but future impacts that might come along.

Baking and Bread Recipes Designed for Modern Life & Times

easy standmixer bread, KitchenAid bread recipe

The goal of my site and my published works has always been to bring self-sustaining knowledge, tips, tricks, and skills, back to the masses; to modify recipes that make it possible for people to make more of their own, cleaner, better, tastier foods from scratch.

I acknowledge that this isn’t always easy when we are in the throes of our “normal” busy day to day lives. So, I’ve always tried to develop helpful posts and books with that in mind, and find the recipes and methods that fit a little more easily into daily life. I’ve had excellent feedback from a number of readers and users saying that they have found these resources to be exactly that—helpful, easier, less-intimidating, and more manageable for today’s busy home cooks.

Judging from the scarcity of flour and basic baking supplies in the stores, people are doing exactly that—becoming a little more self-sufficient, depending more on themselves, and getting lined up to at least be able to bake their own bread and foods for a bit. It’s an excellent skill for the everyday, but one thing we are also learning is that learning and honing a few of these skills now during our time of need is proving an excellent, in fact at times imperative, skill to have in your repertoire. Knowledge can never be lost, and is always worth having, now and in the future—these crazy days prove you never know when you might need to be a little more prepared toward self-sufficiency.

Bake-Your-Own Resources for Beginners to Experienced Bread Bakers

Following is a compiled list of my books and other resources that can help you fill the needs of your pantry while the shelves are bare (and maybe for a long time after!):

*All books are available through Amazon in both Paperback and for instant download via Kindle/Kindle Reader Apps.

Daily Homemade Bread easier, faster homemade bread

your stand mixer (think, KitchenAid® mixer breads). It uses instant/rapid rise yeast to speed and streamline the process.

No pan? No problem! Choose the French or Italian breads that only require a simple baking sheet!

no-knead bread recipes, bake no-knead bread

—so if your yeast supply is getting low, take a look at these recipes! No-Knead bread recipes are also excellent time savers, as the “hands-on” time is virtually nil (and the science of it is kind of fun, too). You’ll find bagels, rolls, and sweet treats, too.

mason jar baking mixes, prep baking mixes

The measuring and proportioning involved in making these mixes is a great project to do with kids—and one that extends learning in a practical way, too!

Even if you don’t want to take the time to make a lot of mixes ahead, the batches themselves make good, easy baking recipes with normal, minimal ingredients.

  • Sourdough Starter Recipe (Levain): Yeast is one of those somewhat scarce ingredients on the grocery stores lately—probably because they don’t stock as much as they used to, anyway, so it can sell out quick with just a few shoppers. Sourdough bread doesn’t need yeast, though. And you don’t need yeast to make a sourdough starter! This is a traditional, healthy bread (actually better tolerated by a lot of people because of the breakdown of the process), often used by frugal mothers and grandmothers and by rural-dwellers who didn’t rely on frequent trips to the corner store—they simply kept a starter culture going in the kitchen instead.

    And yes, you will find some easy sourdough bread recipes in the Quick-Time Homemade Bread book above!  (*Note: Though you do not need yeast to make a sourdough starter or to make sourdough bread, if you have a pinch to spare you can throw it in to make the process go a little faster.)

  • Beer Bread Recipe (plus make-your-own self-rising flour link): Beer bread is technically a quick-bread, but easier and unlike any other you’ve ever eaten.
easy beer bread recipe, no yeast necessary

It’s a quick bread a bit more like regular sandwich bread that is great to have with butter, as a dinner side, or with cheese, and it works well for sandwiches, too.

This recipe could be a real life-saver for those of you who are out of bread and out of time!




Math, Science, Life Skills, Learning…Baking Has a Lot of Educational & Life Value to Offer!

Let’s not forget—baking is actually a very valuable learning exercise that includes a lot of hands-on math and science, reading, and more. For many of you battling the boredom and looking for meaningful, useful ways to muddle through these awkward pseudo-homeschooling times, wrapping in some bread-making and baking activities is truly double-duty!

I hope you find these resources very useful. All are available via Amazon in paperback and for immediate download for Kindle and Kindle e-reader apps; just follow the above links.

Stay safe, take heart, and BE WELL!!




*This post contains affiliate links to helpful books and products, at no additional cost to the reader/purchaser. This will take you to secure login and purchasing via your personal Amazon account. NO personal information is shared with this website from Amazon. Links such as these help to support and maintain this website. Thank you for clicking through to purchase these products!

Your Daily Bread II Available in PAPERBACK!!

Honestly the one biggest “complaint” I’ve had about this book is that it has only been available for Kindle. No more the problem!

Print files are approved and live! It may take a bit of time before Amazon “finds” it and fits it on the site alongside the Kindle version, but this generally happens quickly (I expect by the end of the day, but perhaps up to three).

Keep checking this link or searching the title in Amazon – it’s there even if it doesn’t come up “with” the Kindle edition.

Thanks everyone for your continued patience and patronage!!

UPDATE! This is a link to the paperback product page; it is available for purchase and is ‘in stock’!

It’s a Birthday Book Launch Deal! Volume II Stand Mixer Recipes

Birthday Book Launch! Book II of the KitchenAid & Stand Mixer Bread Series

It’s my birthday and Volume II of the easy stand mixer bread series had gone live just in homestead_bakery_alternatetime!

Your Daily Homemade Bread Volume II: Easy Stand Mixer Dough Recipes: Bagels, Rolls, and Sweet Treats is available now on Amazon and for TODAY ONLY, I’m giving you all a Birthday gift, pricing it at 99 cents. The price will go up to full tomorrow, though, so get it now and tell all your friends to grab while it’s good!

Bagels, Yeast Muffins, and Sweet Stand Mixer Treats

The recipes in this book follow the same simple method as the recipes in the first, using instant yeast and the stand mixer to make your life easy and help you get back to the wholesome traditional foods we all once enjoyed, despite the demands of a time-crunched modern life. Once again, the series offers you a way to make stand mixer bagels, cinnamon rolls, dinner buns, yeast donuts, and even crescents and croissants in the shortest time possible but yielding REAL and DELICIOUS results.

Volume I has gained great praise already, like this very kind and thoughtful review from Amazon buyer V. Kemp:

Finally!… excellent, quick AND flavorful recipes… I love it!

I have always made bread my mother’s old fashioned way… I bought a stand mixer recently to do the kneading for me… her method was a ten minute knead by hand… 2 hr rise… punch down… form… 1.5 hr rise…. and bake for 15 mins at high temp… then 45-50 mins at low temp… to say the least it was a day long project… I purchased this book the other day, and today I tried my first batch of everyday white… and wow… about two hours later, I have delicious, soft, tender, flavorful bread, with a gorgeous crispy crust… I ate almost a half a loaf myself. One batch made me four mini loaves, and twelve Cinnamon buns, without altering the recipe at all, and both were delicious. The fact that I had two successful products in one go makes the price of this book worth it… sorry mom, but your recipe might be a goner… lol

Volume II gives you even more great options to help you fully round out your pantry. Grab your copy today at this special birthday launch price!

 

Stand Mixer Bread Questions and Answers: Mixing In Yeast

From time to time I get questions in from blog readers and book readers asking me to help them out with a situation or clarify something in one of my recipes or in Your Daily Homemade Bread. And since my teachers always told me not to be afraid to ask because if I had a question, chances are someone else does, too, sharing those questions and answers seems to make a lot of sense.

And so, today we start with the first and probably one of the most common questions asked about the stand mixer and KitchenAid bread recipes I’ve published:

Does the Instant Yeast REALLY Get Mixed in With the Dry Ingredients?

Here’s a question from reader BB:

Kitchenaid Bread Recipe

I came across your website and want to try the homemade white bread using my Kitchenaid mixer. My question is this…do I mix the yeast in the water or add it in with “all” dry ingredients? I have baked enough to know that usually the yeast gets mixed with the water first but recipe does not specify so I thought I would ask. Thank you for your time and I can’t wait to try this recipe.

(I believe this question refers to the recipe originally published on the site here, although the recipe is also included in the more comprehensive book along with additional ways to use the white bread dough…like for bread bowls, etc. There is a more complete discussion regarding the use and ease of Instant Yeast, which is used in most all of my stand mixer bread recipes, in my book: Your Daily Homemade Bread: Easy Stand Mixer Bread Recipes: Best Basics.)

This is a completely understandable question because regular active dry yeast does certainly require a period of proofing in liquid to activate it before you can add it to your bread recipe – more measuring, more waiting, more steps. Instant Yeast is a wonderful product because it lets you cut out all that fuss and also cuts out the first long rise and punching down. It literally makes it possible to throw all your ingredients together, knead (preferably with the mixer), and make a virtually hands-free bread, a REAL loaf of bread, with about a quarter of the work and waiting.

My response to the very kind and inquisitive BB was this:

The yeast does not get mixed in with the water. It does not need to proof like regular yeast does. It is correct to mix it in with the dry ingredients and fat, and then add the water to the mix. The reason is that this recipe is using a faster acting yeast (instant yeast, bread machine yeast, or rapid rise versions are all the same and all fine to use). It is specifically designed to cut the time and kneading and to be an easier bread to make.

So while it can be tough for us more traditional cooks to buck something our mothers or grandmothers (maybe your father or grandfather!) taught us, in this case it is most definitely the right thing to do! Embrace the change and this great product and enjoy this easier way to make it possible to eat well traditionally while keeping up in this busy modern world!

Best Kitchenaid Bread Recipe – My Everyday Standby

Looking for great KITCHENAID BREAD RECIPES? Download this book in seconds for all the best basics!
Your Daily Homemade Bread
Easy Stand Mixer Bread Recipes: Best Basics

Under $3.00 – Less than a loaf of bread – 13 recipes and bonus ways to use them!

I don’t buy bread anymore. I make all the bread we eat here. There are six of us, so that means I make homemade bread just about every day. That may sound like a lot but we really like good bread around here. I also think we tend to go through quite a bit just because it’s homemade, and it’s so good! (Please allow me to say so myself–I’m not trying to brag, but it’s homemade bread, and it’s hard for that not to be good 😉 ).

Stand Mixer Bread Recipe I’ve been making all of our bread for a number of years now…probably at least three. I don’t really remember the last time I bought bread. Up until about six months ago I relied heavily on my bread machine. I hardly ever actually baked the bread in the machine. We all liked it so much more if it was baked in the oven and had that more traditional flavor. Most often I would use the “dough” setting on the machine, then take it out and let it rise, then bake it in the oven. It was pretty darn good stuff, but not exactly like Grandma made. That process did take quite a bit of time, too, and only made one loaf at a time. Most days I was doing it twice to have enough bread to feed the family. Still, it was so much better than bread from the store shelves, and I always knew its exact age and exactly what I did and didn’t put into it.

Then one day towards the end of the summer, right before school started and my busiest bread-baking time of the year commenced, my bread maker gave up on me. I had put it through its paces but still I had only had it a couple of years, so I was kind of on the fence about investing in a new one. Bread machines are quite handy, but expensive. I already owned a Kitchenaid mixer (a hand-me-down from my mother-in-law, bless her, which had lasted through years of her ownership, professional cake-making, and at least 10 years with me…I don’t even know how old it is!). I had made bread with it before, but never seemed to quite get the knack enough to make it a simplified, everyday process. My sister told me to forget the bread maker and just use the Kitchenaid like she did, but I didn’t want to give up the “set it and forget it” routine I’d developed with my bread machine and the dough cycle.

I figured what I really needed was a reliable stand mixer bread recipe that didn’t have too many steps and that could still be done in a relatively short amount of time, without a lot of floury kneading. Like I said, I was (am) making bread just about every day of the week, and I didn’t have time or patience for dealing with or cleaning a flour-dusted surface every day, for multiple kneading and rising steps, or for remembering far enough ahead of time to begin such a process.

To cut to the chase of the story, I played with some bread recipes but then finally figured out that what makes bread machine bread simple is the fast-acting yeast (sometimes called instant yeast, sometimes called rapid rise, and all the same thing as the bread machine yeast). Fast acting yeasts actually let you cut out an entire rising, punching, and kneading process. When I figured this out and combined the method for rapid-rise yeast with a good bread recipe I had, I came up with a real winner that is the absolute heart of our meals here at home.

What I ended up with was an excellent kitchen aid recipe for white bread (or stand mixer bread recipe if you don’t have the Kitchenaid brand–we’re not snobs here 😉 that takes only a few minutes of active time to make, that is excellent for everything from toast to sandwiches to French toast and more, and that I can let my mixer whip up and knead for me while I cook supper or muddle through the dishes. Incidentally, it’s a versatile recipe that you should have no trouble cutting part whole grain, oats, or whole wheat flour into, too. And today, I share it here with you!

Best Easy Kitchenaid Bread Recipe

5.0 from 6 reviews
Best Kitchenaid Bread Recipe - My Everyday Standby
Author: 
Recipe type: Yeast Bread
Cuisine: Traditional White Bread
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 2 loaves
 
Finally! An excellent, easy KitchenAid or stand mixer bread recipe that really allows the mixer to do all the mixing and kneading for you.
Ingredients
  • 6½ Cups All-Purpose Flour
  • 3 Tablespoons Sugar
  • 1 Tablespoon Salt
  • 3 Tablespoons Lard (can substitute shortening)
  • 1½ Tablespoons Instant Yeast (Rapid Rise or Bread machine yeast may be substituted in equal amounts)
  • 2½ Cups Very Warm Water (around 120F to allow the yeast to act)
Instructions
  1. Place all dry ingredients and the lard in the KitchenAid mixer.
  2. Using the flat beater attachment, mix dry ingredients and lard through. Use the "stir" or lowest setting, for just 1 to 2 minutes until the dry mix looks uniform.
  3. With the mixer still running, pour in the water and mix just until dough is wet through, shaggy, and sticky--just 30 seconds to a minute.
  4. Stop, remove the flat beater, and place the dough hook onto your stand mixer.
  5. Set to speed 1 or 2 and let the mixer run, kneading the dough, for 6 to 8 minutes.
  6. After kneading, stop, remove the dough hook and let the dough rest in the Kitchenaid mixer bowl for 10 minutes.
  7. Grease 2 bread loaf pans. Shape dough into 2 loaves*, place in pans, and cover with a clean, damp towel. Let rise in a warm place until doubled/about an inch above the rim of the pan.
  8. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes.

*I find this bread rises best and has the best texture if it is pressed out flat on a floured surface and then rolled up, starting with one short end, and then shaping the rolled ends to loaf shape. Now, I know I complained about daily flour messes, but I keep an old cookie sheet on hand dusted with a bit of flour just for quick things like this. I happen to stash it in Kitchenaid Bread Recipean unused wood cook stove, but a long tupperware with a cover or a covered jelly roll pan or something similar could easily accomplish the same thing and be stored with your pans or baking goods.

…And so long as you are flattening the dough, take one of the loaves and before rolling cover the flat surface with a good dose of cinnamon sugar (heavy on the cinnamon), then roll it up, pinch/shape the ends and Voila! You have a delicious cinnamon-swirl loaf for morning toast, too. Now that you have this easy stand mixer bread recipe, you, too can have fresh homemade bread your way, every day!

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