Hey you!

I use my KA almost exclusively for bread and after some degree of trial and error have had very good results.

The two recipes I use most often are Ann T's French Bread recipe...way easy and Annie's Honey Wheat Bread, makes a lot but oh so good! Sol has a "too die for" Honey rolls recipe.

The trick I have found is to:

o Mix half the flour and all the liquid in the KA and let sit for 5 minutes before adding more flour.

o Add the rest of the flour, a bit at a time, but let the dough be on the sticky/wet side. Knead in a bit more flour to make a fairly sticky dough.

I've found that a "wetter" dough" results in a much nicer textured bread. It takes a bit of getting used to but it seems to work!

I am guessing that you are proofing the yeast in too hot water. Doesn't the bread machine heat so you don['t need to proof ahead?....Try not proofing the yeast at all.
Linda C

Linda, you are dead right about not proofing yeast when using a bread machine but Mylab is talking about using her KA not her bread machine.

Even with the KA I don't always proof the yeast. I often just add it to the dried ingredients.

Are you using the mixer to knead the dough? If so, mine says specifically to knead the dough at speed 2 for not more than 2 minutes. You might be over-kneading, thus causing the dense loaves.

My supposition is that she is proofing her yeast in too hot water.....or perhaps kneading the bread too long and causing it to get hot and kill the yeast.
from what I know, you can't over knead....just knead so much that the bread gets too hot and damages the yeast.

Actually, you can overknead. Very hard to do so by hand, unless you have forearms like Popeye, but easy to do with a mixer or FP.

I once tried to knead a recipe from Clayton's 'New Complete Book of Breads' with the food processor. Overdid it. Ended up with hockey pucks instead of loaves.

I just went back to using my KA for baking bread. However, I do take it out at some point and knead it by hand for a while. It's sort of soothing... and I don't know, why I quit doing it that way in the first place.

I wonder, if you could do better if you kneaded it a bit by hand?

Moni

I made Dill Rolls a couple of days ago and decided I really don't need the Zoji bread maker to mix the dough anymore - the KA mixer did a superior job (IMO). The advice above is correct - let the dough be a little wetter than you think it should be and don't over knead it.

Alexa

If you have only used the bread machine to mix and knead your bread dough, you haven't really learned to make dough by hand and feel - no judgement, just sayin'.

When you mix dough by hand, you soon learn when to stop adding flour, let the dough rest for 5-15 minutes so the flour can absorb the liquid. Then you add only enough flour to form a "shaggy mass." As you start to knead (by hand) you can add sprinkles of flour....sprinkles, not a spoonful or scoop full. After kneading for 8 minutes or so by hand, the dough holds it shape, feels smooth (as a baby's bottom) and springs back when pressed deeply with a finger.

I use my KA mixer all the time to make and knead bread dough; like Moni, I knead it a few strokes by hand after kneading by the mixer.

Teresa

Mylab:
Not knocking the other suggestions but try,

Teresa_nc "s and Moni's suggestions.

I always proof the yeast in a 1/2 cup of warm water, then add it to the mixer and other ingredients.

Add enough flour and dump it out when you can handle it without sticking to your hands.

Then you can add enough flour make a soft ball of Dough.

LOU

Teresa, I didn't know to let the dough sit and absorb the flour. Dumb question....when do you do that?

I like to make mine by hand. I've used my bread machine and the KA mixer, and by hand. I want to learn to do it by feel.
I'm still trying to figure out how to keep the dough from sticking to my hands all the time, but I make bread every weekend.

jasdip, usually I mix in most of the flour; if the recipe calls for 5-6 cups, I mix in 4 cups, stir well, cover it, and let it sit for 15 minutes if I have the time. Then I mix in the fifth cup and start kneading - either by hand or in the KA mixer. The last cup is used in the kneading process, added in by sprinkles just until the ball of dough clings to the dough hook and sweeps clean the sides of the mixer bowl.

Then I turn the dough out of the bowl and onto a clean counter-top sprinkled with a little flour and knead a minute or two by hand. Then I drizzle the almost-clean mixing bowl with some vegetable oil and plop in the dough, turn it around in the oil then turn the oil side dough up, put a plastic shower cap or clean drying towel over the bowl and set it to rise in a warm part of my kitchen.

Yes, I am a lazy cook and I do not want to have to wash every dagnabit bowl in the kitchen.
Teresa

Thanks Teresa! Next time, I'm going to let it sit for a little while.

Hey there to you too Chase, and what a nice Christmas suprise to run into you here :)

Thank you all so very much for your advice. I have never worked beside someone who baked bread from hand so I never know exactly how to knead and what the bread should look or feel like, which is why I did love my bread machine for when I wanted to make homemade bread - it tended to turn out pretty well out of the bread machine before baking.

I'm sure I will love my kitchen Aid for bread too, when I get the hang of it, as much as I love it for everything else. I'm not much of a kitchen gadget person but I do love my Kitchen Aid machine.

I have carefully read all the advice - I wouldnt' be surprised to find that I might overknead the bread with the dough hook and I also didn't proof the yeast, because the dough always doubled I figured it was ok?

Will carefully follow all the advice - some of it I have never heard of before - when I do a trial run on the honey buttermilk dinner rolls today. Thank you so VERY much for all the advice!

A merry Christmas to you all :)