America's New Breadbox

Image Gallery The three basic loaf shapes of bread machines are, from top, the tall cube shape, the wide rectangle and the long horizontal.

The Bread Machine! These are words that strike terror into the hearts of artisan bakers and advocates of hands-on home baking, while conjuring up visions of delight to ever-growing hordes of baking enthusiasts who claim they would never bake bread without a machine.

An all-in-one appliance that is certainly an innovation in a time-honored craft, the bread machine creates fresh, satisfying, full-flavored yeast breads. To set the process in motion, all you do is measure and pour the ingredients into the bread pan that serves as the mixing canister, then push a couple of buttons. But a big reason people get so much joy from bread-machine baking has to do with the deep emotional value of making bread, not the appliance itself.

Whether you go out and buy a new machine, inherit one from a friend who never used it or pick one up at a rummage sale, you’ll be thrilled with the results if you give this appliance a fair run.

The convenience of the bread machine has found a new market among people who would otherwise never bake, but nevertheless enjoy good bread: those with the busiest schedules, like on-the-go parents, people who love gadgets and bakers who have physical disabilities that might prevent them from preparing bread by hand. The bread machine also has won over many people already skilled at baking bread by hand, but it has reached many more who were not inspired to learn to bake bread by an older method.

The amount of actual hands-on baking time, apart from assembling the ingredients, is just minutes with a bread machine.

And then, aside from putting away the ingredients and wiping up a bit of flour on the counter, there is no cleanup, which is remarkable for a craft that is known for being messy. The machine mixes, kneads, deflates, allows for the proper rising time, bakes and often cools the loaf, all automatically.

If you tried years ago to use a bread machine and were disappointed with the quality of the loaves, take heed: A new generation of machines that are nothing short of remarkable have come along with improvements to the hardware.

Bread machines are now made by about a dozen manufacturers in various sizes and with a variety of features.

They are not only easy to use, but they inspire you to be creative in your own baking. And bread-machine baking requires so little of your time that you can enjoy the luxury of fresh bread every day. When all the hassle of baking is removed, you can enjoy the entire process — from shopping for ingredients to hearing the cries of delight from appreciative eaters.

With a bread machine, a light and high loaf is the result of using a precise, carefully measured liquid-to-flour ratio in conjunction with a machine’s perfectly controlled series of risings. The controls also may be set to “Dough Only” so that the machine can be used just for the mixing-kneading-rising process, after which you can shape the loaf yourself and bake it in your regular oven to produce a bread that looks more like a traditional, handmade loaf.