Daily Bread Making With A Zojirushi Bread Machine

Is it possible to do daily bread making? In a modern life? It is if you have a few tools and techniques on hand.

A few years back Kirk surprised me with a Zojirushi BB-CEC20 Home Bakery Supreme 2-Pound-Loaf Breadmaker (there’s a mouthful!) to replace my worn out Breadman machine. Since then, daily bread has become so easy to make. Mostly because the bread looks like a normal loaf. The machine has a long pan, with 2 dough paddles inside. Most machines have one paddle, and are square-ish in shape, and bake up tall. This means you can actually make sandwich bread!

This machine has allowed me to make nearly daily bread (3 boys go through a lot!), and without a lot of time invested. The biggest key is prepping it ahead of time, as seen above. I measure out the ingredients and put the flour in a quart mason jar (use a funnel), and any leftover flour (a quart holds about 4 cups all-purpose flour) goes into a second jar, along with any salt, dry milk, sugar, or other dry ingredients. You can prep out weeks of this mind you!

Then, when ready to bake, I add in the water called for, any oil or butter, the dry goods, and then measure out my yeast. It takes less than 5 minutes to get a loaf going.

And here are a few favorite recipes we use:

White Sandwich Loaf

Ingredients:

• 1 1/3 cups water
• 2 Tbsp unsalted butter, or olive oil
• ¼ cup granulated sugar
• 2 tsp fine sea salt
• 4¼ cups all-purpose flour
• 2 Tbsp dry milk
• 2 tsp yeast

Directions:

Add ingredients in order listed. Set loaf for white bread.

If you have a large enough bread machine (2 pound capacity), just follow the method for adding ingredients that it calls for. Zoji’s warm the ingredients for you (this is why a cycle takes longer), so with other machines you would need to use warm water instead, and stack the ingredients as above.

Once fully cooled, store in a sealed bread bag, and use within 2 days for best results. This slices well for freezing. We take out slices at night, put in a sandwich box, and let thaw in the refrigerator overnight.

Makes one 2 pound loaf.

Wheat Sandwich Bread

Ingredients:

• 1 2/3 cups water
• 2 Tbsp olive or sunflower oil
• 3½ cups bread flour
• 1½ cups whole wheat flour
• 2 Tbsp granulated sugar
• 2 Tbsp dry milk
• 1½ tsp fine sea salt
• 2 tsp active dry yeast

Directions:

Following the standard directions for a Zojirushi bread machine, add the water, oil, then the flours, sugar, dry milk, and salt. Make a small divot, add the yeast in it.

Set for a standard loaf of wheat bread.

If you have a large enough bread machine (2 pound capacity), just follow the method for adding ingredients that it calls for. Zoji’s warm the ingredients for you (this is why a cycle takes longer), so with other machines you would need to use warm water instead, and stack the ingredients as above.

Once baked, remove from machine, let cool fully on a rack.

Makes 2 pound loaf.

For best results, once bread is fully cool, store in a large bread bag or 2 gallon zip top bag, and use within 1½ days. For long-term storage, once cooled, slice as desired and double bag, and freeze. Take out slices as desired, let thaw on the counter in a covered container.