AM, my Zo has a special setting for quick breads, so I'm assuming it's a quick mix, no rise and a bake cycle. I haven't used it because I just don't bake that many quick breads. I think whether you allow your kids to use an oven and at what age depends on the kids and on your "worry level". I used the stove and oven way before I was 12. Amanda did too, but she was a very responsible and meticulous child. Ashley was/is prone to being distracted. I've come home more than once to find something turning to charcoal in the oven because she forgot it was there and went somewhere with a friend, or (more likely), that she baked something but forgot to turn off the oven and it had been heating, empty, for several hours. sometimes she turns the oven on, gets distracted and decides not to bake, but forgets to turn the oven off. And, because I am a worrier, I worry all afternoon that something is in the oven or on the stove and I'm going to come home to a house full of smoke, which has happened more than once. Anyway, if you have bread machine recipes, I'd try one of those and see how the machine works. I do have a couple of bread machine cookbooks, I can check when I get home tonight. Annie

Optional clean-up to Carol's method (it's always good to have options ;-). 1. Remove the pan and dump the dough onto a Silpat (NO flour necessary). This is where I de-gas (punch-down), round it, and form dough. Dough doesn't stick to a Silpat and clean-up is a cinch. Just be sure to oil your hands when handling the dough. I keep a small amount of oil (coconut oil for me) in a tiny bowl I can dip my fingers in (between 1 t. and 1 T. - use the larger amount if you are forming rolls, cinnamon rolls, or burger/hot dog buns). 2. Take a rubber or silicon spatula and remove any of the larger globs of dough (usually around the paddle area). If the paddles didn't come out in the dough, remove them and use a spatula to remove any large globs of dough from them, as well as around the paddle pins. 3. Set the pan aside, you'll deal with it later after any dough residue has dried. Meanwhile you'll work with the dough to de-gas it, round it (form into a tight smooth ball), and cover it with plastic wrap for a 10-15 minute rest for the gluten strands to relax before forming the dough - all on the Silpat. I never use bench flour after I take the dough out of the bread machine. Note: if you are making cinnamon rolls, don't cut the dough with a knife or you'll destroy your Silpat, use dental floss for that. 4. Now for the pan. You'll notice any remaining bits of dough are now dry - if not, wait a few more minutes. Take a DRY paper towel (if you don't use paper towels, this is a good place to use that collection of paper napkins in the glove compartment of your car) and wipe the sides of the pan and dump the dry dough residue into the trash. It should be nearly 100% clean. Take a dishrag (with hot soapy water rung out of it) and wipe out the pan, rinse and dry. Around the pins is about the only area you need to be sure it's clean. 5. These two methods (Carol's wet method and my dry method) are necessary since the pan shouldn't be submerged in water. The under-side of the pan contains a lubricant you don't want getting wet. 6. When I first got a Zo, I baked bread in it a few times and there is usually some dried bread residue on it. I would lay the cooled pan on it's side and lay a sopping-wet dishrag over the inside of the pan to loosen the bread residue, instead of the fill-and-soak method Carol uses. Flip it onto the other side and repeat, then wipe it out with a paper towel or wash off with the dishrag - for yet one more cleaning method. The BAKED-on residue isn't as easy to remove as the DRIED-on dough. 7. If you get a baked loaf that sticks to the Zo pan and you can't remove it for love nor money, you are supposed to wrap a wet-with-hot-water towel (wrung out) around the pan sides (NOT the bottom), and through some "miracle" the loaf says "enough already" and will relenquish it's hold on the pan. (Or so I've read...) If that doesn't work, I happen to have a very thin-bladed, stiff, kidney-shaped PLASTIC spatula (Tupperware party freebee a hundred years ago?) I've used to run down the sides of a stuck loaf. NEVER use metal, you don't want to damage the finish on the pan. I use this same spatula to "cut" my dough on the Silpat if I need to divide the dough for more than one loaf. It won't cut the Silpat. 8. I also had better luck removing a loaf if I took it out of the bread machine as soon as it was done baking and would give the pan a few hard shakes to loosen the loaf before I up-ended it onto a cooling rack and removed the pan. You can also leave a "stuck" loaf in the up-ended pan on a cooling rack and gravity and time will usually help drop the loaf out of the pan. -Grainlady

Lars - You open the lid of the bread machine after it's been going for about 5 minutes and check the condition of the dough by looking at it or touching it, and adjust the hydration accordingly, if necessary. What you want is a nice soft, sticky, well-formed ball. Just as in traditional dough making, it's still about the "feel" of the dough. Ingredient measurements in bread recipes are always just a good guess because protein count in wheat/flour and the moisture the flour has absorbed during storage all affect the dough. Flour is usually very dry during the dry winter months, and contains more moisture during humid weather and amount needed often changes because of that. A hard dry dough will end up a bread "brick", so it's necessary to add liquid. If the dough is crumbly and not formed in a ball, add more water. If the dough is loose, sticking to the sides or bottom of the pan, add a bit more flour. From years of experience, I know if I add dry multi-grain cereal or oatmeal at the add-in beep (towards the end of the kneading cycle), it's best to have a dough ball that is a little slack because the dry ingredients will absorb the additional hydration during fermentation. I want a slack dough if I want a holey type of artisan bread. I also want a slack dough for English Muffins to maintain that traditionally holey crumb. I also add chia gel (chia seeds + water) to all my loaves, and I always have to adjust the hydration because of this addition. I also use a liquid sweetener instead of sugar (agave nectar) and it's possible to need a little flour because of the additional liquid from the agave nectar. Hydration requirements changes because of the protein level of the flour, and that will vary with each bag of wheat I purchase, or bag of flour. I recently purchased some hard white winter wheat that is 13.1% protein. That tells me I'll need to some liquid because the higher protein level (gluten) will absorb more hydration. It's just a machine that does the work in bread making. It still needs a human to assess the dough condition. -Grainlady

I had been looking at the Sunbeam 5891. Have you had any experience with those? They can be had for between $50 and $60, they get good reviews and seems to have most of the features that you would need. Do they not do what they say they do? In all likley hood this will not be something that we leave on the counter all the time and will need to be stored away when not in use just like we do with the food processer. I really don't feel comfortable spending $200 on our first bread maker if it's not something that we will continue to use. On the other hand if we need to spend $200 to get a bread maker that actually makes bread instead of just making frustration then we may need to rethink the whole bread making thing. I was thinking that if we could get one in our price range, enjoyed using it, and used it enough to wear it out in a few years then we might invest in a more expensive unit. The Zojirushi units look very nice but I'm just not sure if that's where we need to jump in at. Thanks for your input. What do you think? Here is a link that might be useful: Sunbeam 5891