The No-Fuss Bread Machine Cookbook: Soft Egg Bread

March 7, 2024 Sarah

I recently saw a cookbook that grabbed my attention: The No-Fuss Bread Machine Cookbook: Hands-Off Recipes For Perfect Homemade Bread. It’s been out for a few years, so I am glad I came across it.

When life gets busy, our bread machine is my savior. Putting the ingredients in, walking away while I homeschool the boys, and working on the homestead are everything. Come back 4 hours later to a perfect loaf of bread, especially with how our house runs chilly in winter. It really makes lunch that much simpler.

I was very excited to have many new recipes to try. The book is straightforward to follow and offers three sizes of loaves for each recipe so that you can use a 1-pound, 1½-pound, or 2-pound machine.

This cookbook has many bread options, from regular bread to spice bread, fruit bread, cheese bread, vegetable bread, holiday bread, and even how to start sourdough bread in your bread machine.

I love getting inspired. And it’s just what I needed as winter slides into spring, and I am so busy.

The recipe I chose to try is a rich egg bread, which is very indulgent. Very soft indeed. This recipe alone made going thru this cookbook worth it.

Soft Egg Bread

Ingredients:

1 cup milk*
5 Tbsp butter*
3 eggs*
1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 tsp fine sea salt
4 cups all-purpose or bread flour (480 grams)
1½ tsp bread machine or quick-rise yeast

Directions:

Add ingredients as listed or in the order your bread machine calls for.

Set for Basic/White cycle and medium crust.

Once baked, remove it promptly and let it cool on a wire rack.

Store in a bread bag.

*We use a Zojirushi bread machine, which has a preheating cycle. If your bread machine doesn’t do this:

Milk at 80-90*. The butter melted and cooled down. Eggs at room temperature.

Makes one 2-pound loaf.

~Sarah

Reviewing Augason Farms Honey White Bread Mix

September 28, 2023January 1, 2025 Sarah

I believe in testing your emergency food supply, to see how it tastes, looks and performs. Better to know ahead of time if you will want to use it!

The other week I reviewed a similar product by Thrive Life, their bread mix. I had been happy with the results, though the price point is very high on it (it is 1 loaf of bread per can, and costs $15.89 retail), I can only treat those cans as a fully 100% emergency item. Not something I would use often, simply due to being so expensive.

I remembered I had bought another brand of bread mix, so I dug into our prepper pantry and found a can of Augason Farms Honey White Bread Mix to review it, and see how it performed. I decided to try the 3 1-p0und bread loaves recipe on the back of the #10 can. It costs $10.54 currently on Amazon (full retail price is $25.99, but rarely is at that price).

The Thrive Life Pantry can is 18.51 ounces, and the Augason Farms #10 can is 58 ounces. That means each can of Augason Farms is 3 of the Thrive cans. That drives a solid point with economy. Both come in cans designed to keep the flour fresh for a couple of years. Thrive is only 3 years, where Augason Farms is 10 years. That is a huge jump.

Ingredients:
Bleached flour (wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid, enzyme [improves yeast baking]), sugar, nonfat dry milk, non-iodized salt, soybean oil, honey powder (cane sugar, honey), eggs (whole eggs, less than 2% sodium silicoaluminate as an anticaking agent), soy lecithin, dough conditioner (enriched wheat flour [wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid], ascorbic acid, wheat gluten, enzymes), yeast (yeast, enzymes, soybean oil). CONTAINS: Soy, milk, eggs, wheat.

The takeaway:

Longer shelf life of 10 years versus 3 years for Thrive’s version
Makes 6 loaves bread versus 1 loaf per can
$10.54 versus $15.89
Both come in solid cans designed for long-term storage
Both brands have similar ingredient lists
It’s actually pretty good overall once baked as bread. While not the best I’ve ever baked, it was very easy to prep and bake and had a nice flavor and crumb. It’s miles above how commercially baked bread tastes for sure.
It’s worth having on hand, since it is water tight and lasts a long time on the shelf. Just …. have yeast on hand. We don’t need 2020 panic again, eh? I had 4 pounds of yeast on hand so I baked happily. But many didn’t have any.

You don’t want to have to be buying yeast on the black market again, do you?

Cons:

As with the Thrive Life bread mix, you must provide the activated dry yeast
Must have a solid can opener to open the large (and heavy) #10 can (no pull top on these cans)
Recipes on packaging call for cups, not grams. I figured it out though in the recipe below*. Apocalypse aside, I will always weigh flour versus scooping it.
Needed a bit more flour to get the dough where it needed to be, as I wanted to keep the other half of the bread mix to use later, I added in my own bread flour I had on hand.
Contains soybean oil…but this isn’t uncommon in commercial mixes (Thrive’s contains soybean oil shortening). It is why the mix has a “bioengineered ingredient” listed on the back. It’s nearly always the soy ingredients added.

Honey White Bread Loaves

Ingredients:

2 Tbsp activated dry yeast
2¼ cups warm water (at least 110°)
1/3 cup oil (used avocado oil)
816 grams honey white bread mix (6 cups worth, half the can)
Additional bread or all-purpose flour, as needed
Oil for bowl/bread pans

Directions:

Add the yeast and warm water to a stand mixer with the dough hook in place. Let hydrate for a few minutes.

Add the oil and bread mix. Start on low and mix in, then turn up to medium and let knead for 10 minutes. At 5 minutes, start checking to see if more flour needs to be added, slowly adding a bit each time and letting it work in.

It was still sticky, so I knocked it out on a work surface and kneaded in more flour by hand until the dough was slightly tacky.

Lightly oil a mixing bowl, and add the dough, flipping it over. Cover and let sit for 15 minutes.

Lightly oil 3 bread pans (the sizes are not listed on the recipe; I used 2 regular 9×5 and 1 8×4 pan I had on hand).

Turn the dough out on a lightly floured surface and cut into 3 portions—place in prepared pans.

Cover and let sit for 40 minutes to rise double.

In the last 10 minutes, preheat the oven to 400°.

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden on top. (I went for a darker loaf at 25 minutes)

Knock out on a cooling rack and let it cool fully before slicing.

Bread can be sliced and frozen.

Makes 3 1-pound loaves.

Dough ready to cut into loaves.

Dough ready for 2nd rise.

Dough ready to be baked.

Notes:

By looking at how many “servings” the can made, I deduced it could make up to 6 loaves of bread. Each serving was listed as ¼ cup of dry mix or 34 grams weight. Each recipe above uses 24 servings, and the can has 48 servings of dry mix.

You may notice I use a heating pad for yeast dough. Our house is often quite chilly in fall and winter, so it is my secret to properly raised doughs. I preheat it to medium while I knead the bread, and it’s ready to go.

It slices nicely after cooling and has a light texture. It’s the perfect sandwich size of a loaf.

~Sarah

Reviews

Reviewing Thrive Life Country White Dough Mix

September 9, 2023January 1, 2025 Sarah

I try to always use what I purchase for our long-term pantry at least once – so I’ll know wether or not it is worth buying more of. Because what good is it to have a pantry full of food you hope to never have to eat? (See here for a recent review on our sister site about an emergency food kit I would not buy again. So, yes, trying out food is important!)

Awhile back the Thrive Life Country White Dough Mix was on a sale, so I bought a can to try out. It sat on my shelf for awhile, but I decided to try it out with the cooling weather. Fall coming really has me baking bread.

It’s daily price isn’t low, but if it’s on sale it drops it quite a bit. That was enough to lure me in to try it. Each can is 1 loaf of bread. So, no, it’s not what I would classify as affordable, even on sale. But it does have some good points, that could make it having on hand.

It is pre-measured. You only need water and yeast to get going. It could even be used in a bread machine as well. The directions call for using a stand mixer with a dough hook (which I did use) and to knead for 5 minutes. Of course one could do hand kneading, with no issues.

I took the perfectly mixed dough (no need to add more water or more flour with it), put it in a lightly oiled mixing bowl, flip it, and cover with plastic wrap.

My house was a chilly 63°, Fall is very much coming, so I used a heating pad under the dough to help the first rise, which it really needed.

I gave the dough an hour to double.

At this point I could have made it into a boring loaf of bread, instead I opted to make Herbed Focaccia Bread. I knew the boys would really like that more. And it was well worth it. The bread turned out fluffy, light and indulgent.

Well worth making.

So yes, not a cheap thing to stock, but it was worth it since it turned out so tasty.

Herbed Focaccia Bread

Ingredients:

1 can Country White Bread dough mix
1 cup + 2 Tbsp warm water
2¼ tsp activated yeast (1 packet)

Ingredients For Focaccia:

2 Tbsp olive or avocado oil
2 Tbsp melted unsalted butter
1 head of garlic, minced
1 tsp dried parsley
1 tsp dried basil
½ cup parmesan cheese
½ cup shredded mozzarella

Directions:

Place yeast in a stand mixer bowl with the dough hook on. Add in the water and the bread mix. Mix in slowly on low, then let knead for 5 minutes. The dough should be a ball that is satin smooth and not sticky.

Lightly oil a mixing bowl, add in the dough, flip over to coat. Cover with plastic wrap, let sit for an hour, or until doubled.

Due to cold temperatures in our house, I used a heating pad on low under it.

Add the 2 Tablespoons oil to a 9×13″ glass baking pan, and spread it across and up the sides.

Take out the dough, add to the pan and work to stretch it out, to fit.

Make gentle dimples in the dough, with your finger tips.

Pour the melted butter over the dough.

Sprinkle on the garlic and herbs.

Add the parmesan and then the mozzarella cheese evenly.

Cover with plastic wrap, let rise for 45 minutes, or so.

Preheat your oven to 400° in the last 15 minutes time.

Take off the plastic wrap and bake for 20 to 25 minutes. The bread should be golden on the sides, and the cheese all golden.

Let cool on a wire rack, slice and enjoy. Leftovers should be covered once cooled to stay fresh.

Out of the oven.

First slice.

Not dense at all, so fluffy.

~Sarah

Gardening · Reviews

Jiffy Starting Trays Review

March 12, 2021 Sarah

While I normally don’t buy the tray setups sold in late winter/early spring at garden centers, this year we picked up a number of Jiffy products to try out. The tray system comes with a tray (the base), a clear plastic lid that acts as a mini greenhouse, and peat pellets that expand to form natural “pots” for your seeds. The larger setups also include an inner tray, to hold the pellets. Some of the kits also included tag markers and 3 of them even came with liquid plant feed.

We checked out a number of garden centers, and for in person buying Wal-Mart was the best stocked, with all the choices, including some of the refills.

They have worked well to teach the boys more about seeds (science) and the outdoors, as part of their homeschooling. I was wandering through a store the other week when it occurred to me this would be a great project for the boys and that was what started the whole review.

For a small scale garden (a couple small raised beds) I can see how these trays work well. No mess, no fussing around. You don’t have to buy anything extra for them. After years of large scale planting of seeds, it’s easy to overlook this. Not everyone wants to or needs 1000’s of 4″ pots, and 1022 trays, and large quantities of custom blended potting mix. Most people don’t have the space for this, nor the need. So I remembered…maybe there is a place for systems like Jiffy, for when 6 tomato plants is plenty, rather then needing 100 of a plant variety.

First off: No need to mix up potting soil and fill cups and get them ready. There was no mess involved. All I needed was water to soak the pellets. It was easy. Even the boys could do it. And that is something interesting. I followed the directions to use warm water the first 2 trays, then I deviated outside and used ice cold water in 5 gallon buckets, with a small watering can. It worked just fine with cold water, yes it took longer, but to make up for it, I put the clear lids on, and it heated up on its own, absorbing the water right up. The key is to cover the pellets with water and check back, adding more until all the pellets are fully hydrated. Expect the largest pellet size to take 10 to 15 minutes, with the smaller ones rehydrating a lot faster.

How do you know which to buy? It depends on your seeds of choice. For flowers and herbs, the smaller pellet size of say 36MM works great. For bigger seeds, such as green beans, peas, and so on, use the larger size pellets. They will need more grow space for their roots. Tomatoes do best in the largest, unless you plan on upsizing into a larger pot (I do this for my plants I sell).

The sizes we picked up:

The small 36MM 12 peat pellets greenhouse kit fits on deep windowsills, and is a great size for children to use, for homeschool projects. We have a couple of them lining the dining room window, getting the warm afternoon sun.

The 16 Peat Pellet Greenhouse Kit, in 50 MM size. These work well for tomatoes, as noted. They are large pellets.

The 25 Peat Pellet Starter Greenhouse, in 42MM size. I planted tomatoes in these as well. Because why not?

The 36 Peat Pellet Greenhouse Kit, in 50 MM size. With their large size this kit would be great for beans and corn, both of which don’t like transplanting.

The 72 Peat Pellet Greenhouse, in 36MM size. I had forgotten to plant Oregon Spring tomatoes, one I usually grow a lot of, for both sale and planting here. 72 plants is crazy numbers I know. For most people. But if I want a couple hundred jars of salsa canned this coming summer, you grow a lot of plants.

All the little greenhouses. The lids sit on top, and they do keep the moisture in. I was checking the seeds we started for the boys and we had germination within 4 days for the first flowers.

Most of the kits had this on the back, where it has a cut out that you can note what seeds you planted in each pellet.

Rehydrated, seeded and ready to be tucked away to grow under cover (in one of the pop up greenhouses). And it self waters itself with condensation, meaning less checking for water needed.

Having invested into the trays, I will continue to reuse them, and I will pick up pellet refills to use. Gimmicky? Sure. But they do work, so I stand corrected on overlooking them before.

~Sarah

Gardening · Herbalism · Reviews

Hydropod Review

March 20, 2019 Sarah

I came across the Hydropod this winter, and picked it up for the boys to use. While they are active with our farm, I prefer to keep them out of the greenhouse in growing season. Just too many precariously placed 1020 trays that can get knocked over. So my feeling was they could enjoy the Hydropod inside the house – and not make a mess.

The review: It works. And it does that while looking gorgeous. And that is the key – it is fashionable and will fit into any room. The base is frosted glass, the top is white plastic. 2 parts and that is it. All one does is open the coconut husk peat pod, put it into the white holder, add water to the base, a pinch of included plant food, and drop 2 of the included basil seeds in. Place in a sunny area and walk away.

It sits near the boys computer in the very sunny dining room, on the window sill. I turn it every day usually, so it evenly gets sun exposure.

Once it started really growing, I changed the water and added more food as the directions called for. The cool part is being able to show the boys the roots coming through the bottom, into the water. The boys love seeing this. Once the plant is a bit bigger, we will transfer it into a pot, with potting mix and take it to the greenhouse to finish growing – and start some more seeds!

The Hydropod is reusable, however the company (W&P) that makes it doesn’t exactly tell you what to buy, nor do they offer refills. I would think most pods would do just fine, as long as they stay firm. And they are not hard to source either online, or at hardware/garden stores. The setup isn’t cheap, but it isn’t pricey either and it is attractive as decor. What I liked is it doesn’t require electricity (since no grow lights) and you could have a couple of them in a sunny window doing their thing. The other (huge) thing is the device doesn’t have an odor – where as pots grown inside often have a musty, earthy smell, there is no smell from it.

~Sarah