Using Your Loaf

I've been using my Black & Decker bread machine for donkey's years, and it's served me faithfully, never going wrong. I used it mostly for mixing the bread dough, and then baked the loaves in the oven, and only rarely baked the bread in the machine itself.

But recently I found the dough had smeary black bits in it, and I discovered that the little paddle thingy that mixes the dough was starting to grind itself to bits and leave a metal dust behind. Definitely not what I want to find in my breakfast toast.

So off to the internet to look for a spare part. Nope.... the machine is too ancient, spare parts for that model are discontinued. So now I start looking at Kijiji and Craig's List. Lots of used bread machines for sale, all sizes, shapes and makes, and I finally found one that looked like mine for $20.

I phoned to make sure it was still available, and it was, so I headed out to the address I was given, only a 20 minute drive away. Lovely house in an upscale neighbourhood. The people were Iranian. The bread machine obviously hadn't been used much, it was clean, and in great shape, so I happily parted with my $20.

“Good bread is the most fundamentally satisfying of all foods; and good bread with fresh butter, the greatest of feasts.”     -   James Beard.

When I got it home, I discovered that the bread machine was slightly bigger and a more updated model than mine. I was intending to replace the paddle in my old machine, but I've been mixing bread dough in the newer machine for a couple of weeks now and it's working well. A good $20 investment.

And this is the result. Yummy, eh?