Product Review: Pamel's Bread Mix and Flour Blend

Recipe Title: Pamela's Amazing Bread
Recipe Link: http://www.pamelasproducts.com/recipes/amazingbread.html
Product Link: http://www.pamelasproducts.com/ProductsMIXES.html#BREAD
Status: Approved
Rating: 10/10

Jen's Notes: One of these days, I'm going to start taking my own food pictures. Soon, my lovelies, soon.

In the mean time, you can occupy yourself with another product review from your favorite reviewer (right? right??). As you know, I've been trying to find a great bread recipe so that my adoring husband can have a sandwich for lunch. So far, it hasn't gone too well. So this week, I did the unthinkable.

I bought a mix.

I know, I know. It's shocking. I've always been a from-scratch kind of baker, and here I am buying a mix. It broke my heart to do it, but what kind of wife would I be if I let the hubby eat plain old meat cheese for lunch? See, you couldn't do it either. But enough chatter. On to the review!

Short summary: Awesome. It was easy-peezy to make, especially if you have a bread machine. I would recommend whisking your eggs together first, as always. Then it's just dump liquids + mix + yeast into the bread machine pan, set to desired cycle and go do something else for three hours. Really, the hardest part about making this recipe was hauling out the bread machine and getting the pan snapped back into place.

The flavor, you ask? Incredible. This was, much to my chagrin, the best gluten-free bread I've had so far. With last week's pudding catastrophe still fresh in my mind, you can only imagine the joy I felt when I watched the dough start to come together in the bread machine, and it actually looked like dough! Real, honest-to-goodness dough. And it tastes like bread too. Yes, it even works for sandwiches. Hubby has been happily having real sandwiches all week with this bread. This bread is still a bit dense, so he only uses one slice of bread folded over. I'm going to try adding an extra egg to see if that lightens things up a bit.

My only complaint is the price. The mix (at my grocery store, anyways) is about $6 per small bag, and that bag only makes one loaf. So the quest for the perfect bread recipe will continue, but I've promised hubby to keep making this bread until I can find a suitable from-scratch alternative. I'm planning to do some fiddling in the kitchen this weekend, so keep your eyes peeled!

Also, I'll throw in a little side review today. If you're like me, and have problems slicing bread evenly, you might want to consider getting a slicer. I spent an hour or two searching online, and I believe I've found the most bang for your buck in Rival's Fold-Up Food Slicer. It's only $40, and it allows you to set the slicer to your desired thickness. It folds up too, so that makes it a little easier to store. Hang on to the instruction book for awhile, though, or you might forget how to put it back together (I did). I didn't have any problem using it, and one nice feature is that you have to hold down two buttons together to get the blade to turn -- definitely a plus if you have a little one running around, and you don't want them to sever their limbs. I can't speak to its durability just yet, since we've only had it for a week, but I like it quite a bit so far. You will need to order it online, though, because Wal-Mart doesn't carry it in the store.

Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 3.5 hours
Start to Finish: 3.5 hours + 5 minutes

White Bread for Bread Machines

Recipe Title: Gluten-Free White Bread for Bread Machines
Recipe Link: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Gluten-Free-White-Bread-for-Bread-Machines/Detail.aspx

Status: Needs Work
Rating: 1/10

Jen's Notes: This recipe was pretty easy to make. Based on the reviews that I read ahead of time, I decided to pre-mix the ingredients before putting it into the bread machine. I also chose to substitute tapioca flour for the soy flour since I didn't have any soy flour on hand. The mixture came out extremely liquidy - more like pudding then anything resembling bread. So I added another cup of white rice flour, based on the advice of another reviewer. That definitely thickened the mixture up somewhat, but it was still on the thin side. I decided to let it ride, however, and see how it turned out.

One note I will make is that, if your buttermilk is not at room temperature, you can probably nuke it in the microwave but only for a very short time period. I nuked it for a minute, and the milk curdled. So I ended up letting it sit for awhile anyway.

After nearly four hours in the bread machine, I pulled out my loaf of bread. Epic fail. The top of it looked like someone punched it. The sides were very tall, but the middle was sunken in quite a bit. We decided to hang onto it for the next day anyway, just in case it tasted good but didn't look pretty. Unfortunately, it tasted horrible. I didn't actually get to eat any of it because my husband threw away the entire loaf after taking one bite.

Now you might wonder why this hasn't been moved over to the VETOED category. Mostly, it is because I am determined to find a good recipe for bread without using a mix. I refuse to spend $6/loaf on cardboard pre-made loaves, and the $6/bag of baking mix doesn't leave me feeling too happy either. So I think I want to play with the recipe a bit before giving up on it completely. I don't recommend making this recipe according to the directions linked above - you'll only be throwing away money.


Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 3 hours, 50 minutes
Start to Finish: 4 hours, 10 minutes

Gluten-Free Multi-Grain Sandwich Bread

Recipe Title: Gluten-Free Multi-Grain Sandwich Bread

Recipe Link: http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2009/03/gluten-free-multi-grain-sandwich-bread.html

Status: Approved!
Rating: 7/10

Jen's Notes: I have a bread machine now, and it was free, courtesy of a friend at work (apprently, she doesn't use it)! This attempt at bread went much better than the last one. I did decide to skip the sesame seed topping, but I don't think that effects the flavor much.

The only snag I hit this time was that, when I took the bread out, the top was sunk in a bit and there was this weird layered look to the loaf. I'm not sure what caused this, but I think the yeast might not have proofed quite right. It didn't get all that foamy but I used it anyway. I'm fairly sure that explains the sunken top, but I don't know about the layered look.

In spite of layered weirdness, the taste is still yummy. It tastes basically just like plain white bread that you buy from the store, minus all that icky gluten. The only reason it lost a point in the rating is that it didn't make much bread. When I sliced it up, I only ended up with about six slices (admittedly, I slice bread crooked as hell). This could be due to the possible yeast issues, so I'll change the rating if I get a bigger loaf the next time.

Edit: After making this recipe a couple of times now, I've decided to drop the rating down a bit. While it does taste good, it doesn't work as sandwich bread very well. After about a day, the texture becomes too crumbly and falls apart easily. It would make a good bread to serve on the side of a meal, or a snack perhaps. But since this was called a "sandwich bread" specifically, I'm dropping the rating.

Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 2 hours
Start to Finish: 2 hours, 30 minutes

Gluten-Free Ryeless Rye Bread

Recipe Title: Gluten-Free Ryeless Rye Bread

Recipe Link: http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2009/02/gluten-free-rye-bread-recipe-seriously.html

Status: Tested, and approved

Rating: 7 out of 10 (due to snags, not taste)

Jen's Notes: We bought our first loaf of gluten-free bread on Monday ($6 for a half loaf), and threw it out on Tuesday. Horrible doesn't even begin to describe it. So I found some bread recipes online, and decided to try out this one. Overall, I was pretty pleased with the result. If you don't have a breadmaker, don't worry. I went the mixer-and-oven route, and it turned out just fine.

I did hit a couple of snags. The first one was with the yeast. Not being a bread baker, yeast is something I've only used once or twice. This recipe requires you to proof the yeast. The first attempt, nothing happened so I tossed it out and tried again. I recommend that you let your tap water get really good and hot. Lukewarm is not going to cut it for this step. If your tap water doesn't get very hot, you might want to heat on the stove (I wouldn't let it boil though, I suspect that's too hot). So what I did was take a cereal bowl and dump my tablespoon of yeast in the bowl. Then, after the tap water was good and hot, I measured out a cup, poured it into the bowl and immediately whisked it together until the yeast was dissolved. Then I drizzled in some honey and whisked a little more. Let it sit for about ten minutes, and it had a nice, foamy head on it (like beer).

The next snag came the first time I tried to take it of the oven. I thumped the top of the loaf (the only exposed part), and it sounded hollow so I thought it was done. So I tried to take out of the pan. Problem? The loaf split in half, with the bottom still clinging to the pan and the middle was clearly NOT cooked as it was still semi-liquidy. So I smooshed the loaf back together and put it back in the oven. It ended up baking for about an hour, with me testing it every now and then with a knife for stickiness. Sadly, the rip I created when I pulled it out of the oven the first time didn't fix itself so using this loaf for sandwich bread (as planned) isn't happening this time around.

I think part of my problem with the undercooked middle might have been my oven. I live in an apartment, and we all know how they only use top quality appliances (eyeroll). I do a lot of baking in this oven without any problems, but most of my recipes cook at 375 (versus the 350 prescribed in this one). So, I think I'll try it at 375 next time and see if that works out better. I would say that if you usually bake things at hotter temperature than 350, you might want to consider adjusting the temp you use for this bread as well.

Another snag? This one is entirely my fault, but I should have lined the loaf pan with parchment paper, or at least some non-stick spray (I'm not sure if that's gluten-free, so check before you use it). Getting the loaf out of the pan was a pain, even after it was cooked.

In the end, the bread was terrific. I'm not even the one who has to eat gluten-free, and I was still snacking on it. It's very yummy, and tasted just like rye bread. I think that this will be very easy to make once I get past the learning curve.

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 1 hours

Start to Finish: 1 hour, 20 minutes