I want fluffy bread.

[JeAiJa]

Hi, Ive stopped using my bread maker as it makes ,what I call, cake bread🍞 - as in, it’s not fluffy and light. It comes out small, heavy with little to no bubbles.
I love bread so I still scoff the lot but it’s SO heavy.
i follow the recipe but just throw it all in together, What am I doing wrong? Should I give it another go and put the salt in first, yeast in last or mix the yeast in the flour or warm water???????

Try the olive oil bread from the BBC Good Food website. It works every time for me and super easy.

Put the yeast in first & the salt as the last dry ingredient.
Use proper block butter, not margarine or oil.

You could try replacing a few ounces of the bread flour with plain flour.

When a friend was having issues they added an egg.

What order does your bread maker manual say to put ingredients in? It's important to follow what the machine says regardless of the recipe. Most say liquid first, sugar/butter/oil if used, flour on top and then yeast on top of that if using dried yeast. I use fresh yeast so I usually dissolve it in the liquid.

You could also try running the machine on the dough cycle only and take out the dough and give it final rise and bake in oven, just as an experiment to see if it's the recipe that's at fault or the machine. If it bakes fine in the oven then its the machine has an issue. I do both depending on what I'm making but the oven bakes are always better I must say. Machine more convenient obviously though.

How old is your yeast? Old yeast could be impacting the fresh lightness of your bread.

I have made bread for years, my favourite at min is Nigella’s old fashioned sandwich loaf. I would describe it as fluffy. I do it in kitchen aid and it get 10 secs every 10 mins, think I do four times. It is so good.

I use this recipe as well. No Kitchen Aid or breadmaker - it's very easy to do by hand.

I found that hand kneading was the way to guarantee fluffiness - no extra ingredients necessary, just flour, water, sea salt, yeast and some muscle. As I was doing it by hand, I'd prove then knock back (with a damp teatowel over the top both times).

OK, I'd end up with absolutely huge loaves as a result, but nobody seemed to complain about that.

I think the common factor with last few comments is the loaves are being baked in the oven, there is no doubt a breadmaker is convenient but the oven bakes better! You sacrifice a bit of consistency for the convenience of a hands off job.