Breadmakers- are they can't live without them items or something which just gathers dust in the cupboard?

[DarrellRivers]

Wondering whether to get one from my mum for Christmas
Like the idea of baking my own bread, and find never get round to making my own as never really sort out the rising/yeast malarky with the dough.
Recently read in a magazine , that a breadmaker is a useless gadget, but this list also included a garlic press and I love my garlic press
So I need both sides, how many would recommend? who would say avoid?

i love ours. BUT i never make bread in it. (it turns out horribly). i use it to make dough: pizza dough, rolls etc.
works great for that!

we use ours every day and rarely buy bread. But I know others who had one and never used it.

It depends on you really - it only takes a minute to put the ingredients in - but you do have to time it so you are there to get it out when it is done. And you do have to make sure you have all the ingredients - and bread flour is heavy so can be a pain when shopping.

I am quite good at having stuff in cupboards, i always have stuff to bake a cake, I think I would like something which made making bread a bit like baking a cake.
And we get through so much bread, i am bored of buying the darn stuff

i am scared of ours tho it was my idea. too many beepy buttons to get to the right setting for my pg brains at the time.

dh however is stoked by it. if you only use your mobile for calls and the occasional text then your reaction may be similar to mine.

actually DH does ours - I buy the stuff - he makes it.

(I do pizza dough but somehow screw the bread up whenever I try it).

Sounds like you might well use it - so go for it - get the panasonic one - widely recommended as the best.

Admittedly I am a fly by the seat of your pants type of girl and think only feeble people read instruction leaflets, so I might come unstuck!
What models have people got , there was a kenwood bm 250 one for £50 on JL website, that seemed a better price than £100 for starters

i have the panasonic one throckenholt mentioned - took the MN advice and happy with results.

nice to see you again throck. i'm a semi-oldie under a newish name

ok, will take advice re panasonic machine, do you know if it is the £80 or £100 one?

mine was reduced in JL but think it was the cheaper one.

I LOVE mine and use it every day for bread

One tip though...buy proper extra strong bread flour, not supermarket own brand!

Will go and search the archives and then trawl to find the cheapest retailer, many thanks everyone

don't bother with the nut dispenser bit.

And I am a read the instructions afterwards merchant too - doesn't really work with breadmakers (hence DH being master breadmaker in our house) - you have to get the proportions right - particularly salt, sugar, yeast and water (hmm - that's nearly everything !!).

nobody memorable throckenholt, but back in '05 I got a lot of sensible parenting and bfing advice from you and always remembered your name and read your posts.

The Panasonic one is the best, I reckon - I did loads of research and everyone seemed to think it was worth spending the extra. I think for the extra £20 you get a device that adds raisins, seeds etc at the right time (you can't add them at the beginning or the blades slice them up). It's not the end of the world if you don't have that - the cheaper one bleeps when it's time to do it, I think.

I use it loads for a while then get lazy and forget about it. Am currently in a "using it loads" phase, and made pizza dough for the first time the other day which was delicious. The children really like raisin bread, and the recipe book has lots of other options.