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The recipe itself is so simple: 500 grams of strong bread flour, 10 grams of salt, 10 grams of yeast and 350 grams of water. That’s not an error: You stick a measuring jug on a weighing scale and weigh the water for a more accurate measurement. Once mixed, you have to get the dough onto the table and work it. The mix is sticky. Don’t add flour. Trust the process.
Unfortunately, in my experience that’s where the upsides to breadmakers stop and the downsides begin. You will never get the same quality of bread from a machine that you will get mixing the dough by hand. The second big downside, and the one that’s more heartbreaking, is the smell that wafts upstairs each morning isn’t that great. Even on the lightest setting the bread comes out overdone compared to the real thing. No matter what recipe I tried, the smells are overwhelmingly yeasty and sour, which makes me less enthused about the morning feast. What emerges has the physical and mechanical properties of bread but very little actual flavor.