The Pros And Cons Of Owning A Breadmaker

I don't really remember how my obsession with getting a breadmaker started. Perhaps it was a conversation with 222, I'm not too sure. But anyway, somehow it got into my head that I wanted one and +3 bought one for me to celebrate our first anniversary.

To be frank, I think he wasn't all that keen to get one but I kept talking and talking and talking about it. Thankfully, after waking up to the smells of freshly baked bread the next morning, he was sold.

I've been posting the pictures of bread that I've baked, plus incessantly yakking to anyone and everyone who would hear about the awesomeness of the breadmaker. And so I thought I'd summarise the pros and cons of getting my breadmaker (Zojirushi Home Bakery Mini -  BB HAQ10).

Pros- Yummy Smells + Timer Setting
I think one of the best things about  getting a breadmaker is waking up to the smells of freshly baked bread in the morning. I'm not sure if it is something all breadmakers can do, but mine has a timer function that allows you to set it up to 13 (I think), hours in advance.

Pros- Easy to Prepare
I usually prepare the ingredients before going to bed, set the timer, potter around the house and then go to bed. When we wake up in the morning, it's done! No need to knead and wait for the dough to proof, then punch it down and proof again before baking. Heck, I don't even need to mix the ingredients together. Just measure it out and put them in the pan (in the order stated in the recipe book). It's *so* easy.

Pros- No Preservatives
A big draw for me was being able to bake bread that had no preservatives in it. Because we bake the bread in small portions, it also means that we finish the bread sooner and do not need to keep it.

Pros- Environmentally Friendly
I didn't really think about this but +3 shared that one of the things he really liked is how we consume less plastics now since we don't have to individually wrap each loaf of bread in plastic packaging. A good point!

Of course, I have to be realistic and talk about the cons.

Cons- Space
One of the major reasons +3 wasn't so keen on getting a breadmaker is the lack of space in the kitchen. But eventually we found a space for it.

Cons- Not So Cost Effective
On top of the cost of buying the machine ($338 on sale), you have to keep buying ingredients. To start we bought a 1kg bag of bread flour ($3.50 I think), some yeast (5 packets for $2), and dried milk ($19.90 for 1kg -  why is milk so expensive!). We already had sugar and salt.

I'm assuming the milk powder will last forever since each loaf only requires about 2 tablespoons of the stuff.  A packet of yeast lasts for about 4-5 loaves, and the bag of flour about 3 loaves. So you will keep having to buy flour if you plan on baking bred regularly.

Cons- Hot Loaf And Slicing
Ok maybe this isn't really a con but being used to having room temperature sliced bread from the supermarket, it does get a tad tiring to have to deal with hot appliances when you just wake up in the morning. And we don't have a bread knife so I've been hacking at my loaves of bread with a chopping knife.  Lol.

Cons- The Mess
Again, this could be because of aforementioned hacking of bread but the crumbs make a mess. 

Anyway all in all I do think the pros outweigh the cons and would highly recommend getting one.