Can i make rolls from scratch without a bread machine OR fancy mixer?

[madteaparty]

I want to institute a soup and bread night. My family likes soup ok, not crazy for it, so I think adding warm break might help. I don't want to collect more appliances as I am not much of a baker (I am a decent cook otherwise, just not very precise so advanced baking is not for me). can I make rolls with my bare hands and an old hand mixer if I can find it? Bonus if healthy (i.e. whole grain, seeds added, what have you)

[marbel]

I use a Kitchenaid stand mixer, but people make bread by hand all the time!  The kneading can get a bit tedious, but it can be done and it's a great upper-arm workout - I know a few women who prefer to knead dough by hand for that reason.  I would not attempt to use a hand mixer for bread dough; you would probably burn out the motor. 

[FriedClams]

Absolutely! But, a $5 garage sale bread machine will make your life so simple. With a machine you can make and period dough with no effort, then shape and bake. Super easy. Without a machine you have to knead yourself, and proof (rise, where times can vary based on room temp). Either way, after 5 runs your time to make will decrease by 5 million percent, so stick with it!

[ILiveInFlipFlops]

Absolutely! But, a $5 garage sale bread machine will make your life so simple. With a machine you can make and period dough with no effort, then shape and bake. Super easy. Without a machine you have to knead yourself, and proof (rise, where times can vary based on room temp). Either way, after 5 runs your time to make will decrease by 5 million percent, so stick with it!

 

:iagree: with all of this. 

 

ETA: Have you considered making focaccia instead of rolls? The kneading for the recipe I use is minimal, and I find it an easy way to add bread to a meal here. I don't really even use the method in this recipe anymore, and unless for some reason the bowl is really goopy, most of the time I even just use the same bowl and oil over any gunk left on the sides. (You'll find yourself customizing to make life easier as you get familiar with the recipe, just like with any other.) You can add the garlic/parm cheese/rosemary or not, and if you have leftovers, you can use them to make little pizzas the next day :D

 

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/easy-focaccia/detail.aspx

[Tess in the Burbs]

I found a bread machine at a garage sale once...in great condition.  But yes, people made bread long ago with no electricity.  Just hard work.  It can be done.  But I would keep an eye out on craigslist or garage sale for something to help you. 

[SebastianCat]

I make homemade rolls all the time by hand - with a big mixing bowl, a wooden spoon, and knead by hand.   It's not that hard.   If you are using whole wheat flour or have ground your own flour, the dough is much heavier and can burn out the engine in most mixers or bread machines, so I wouldn't buy an appliance until you really have a feel for what you and your family will like.

[In The Great White North]

The Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day makes great rolls.

[Crimson Wife]

Yes, but as mentioned it's a pain to knead.

[MomatHWTK]

You have two bread kneaders at your disposal, just have them wash their hands first.  ;)

[Annie G]

I second the focaccia  suggestion. It's SUPER easy to make, you can add any flavors you want, and cut into small squares, is great to serve with soup.  Leftovers are good cold, reheated, and make nice rustic sandwiches. 

[Lady Marmalade]

The Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day makes great rolls.

 

This.  I have a bucket of the dough in my fridge right now.  You lop off a piece, let it come to room temperature, and bake.  

 

It also makes a great loaf of bread, foccacia, and deep dish pizza crust.  All for the effort of simply mixing together flour, water, salt and yeast until the ingredients are combined.

[LostSurprise]

It's actually pretty easy and not that physically demanding for the average person...just time consuming. I made bread by hand after trying a bread machine. The machine was just not for me. I liked the experience of working the dough by hand. You learn a lot more about bread baking that way. It's a very sensory experience. Kids usually love it. 

 

Consider checking out Healthy Bread in 5 Minutes a Day (subsequent book by the authors of the book mentioned by Great White North). If you have room in your fridge, it works pretty well and doesn't require any kneading (although you still have to rise, chill, remove, rise, bake). 

 

If you don't have room in your fridge check out Jim Lahey's My Bread. He also has a no-knead method (the one printed in the New York Times) which works well. If you google around you'll see it's a very old method used by various European peasants. It usually meant leaving the dough out for a certain number of hours (18-20) and then baked in a closed oven (dutch oven). 

 

Most bread baking is figuring out timing. The actual work is pretty low. There's a lot of recognizing when the dough is ready, starting it when it will fit in your schedule, but not a lot of work. 

[umsami]

I bought a bread machine at the Goodwill for $10….but I also highly recommend the no-knead/artisan recipes.  It makes wonderful bread and rolls…with no special equipment needed.  We've even used the dough to make pizza crust, pita bread, and cinnamon rolls. :)

 

http://www.simplysogood.com/2013/03/artisan-no-knead-bread.html

[Kathryn]

Bread was invented before electricity, so I say yes.

[redsquirrel]

absolutely. I made bread for years before I had a bread machine or a stand mixer.

 

Go to your public library and find a bread cookbook and use that.

 

I used "Enchanted Broccoli Forest" cookbook to learn to make bread, but that was what I owned. I am sure there are lots in the library. Or ask around and ask someone to show you how. I also learned a lot from watching friends make bread by hand. And I made a LOT of bread, not all of it any good, lol. It gets better the more you do it. There is a learning curve, as with anything. And you have your good days and your bad days. These days my person favorite bread cookbook is the King Arthur Flour anniversary cookbook, but I use quite a few others.

 

My kids both want to learn how to make bread and they know that when they are learning it is going to hand at first.

 

And I agree that "Artisan bread in 5 mins a day" is a great place to start. It is no knead and takes very little work. I would TOTALLY be doing that if my family ate that kind of bread. Right now we are in more of a 'we need sandwich bread' phase, so no rolls or hot bread with dinner.  These days I make sturdy little loaves of whole wheat bread that gets toasted and grilled in sandwiches and spread with peanut butter, that sort of thing. Nothing artisan about it, lol.

[Miss Tick]

The artisan bread book didn't work for me.

 

We do soup once a week in the cold days. I make a double batch of soup and three meals worth of rolls. Then I freeze the extras and use them in subsequent weeks. I highly recommend this method!

 

ETA: often making rolls healthier changes the taste a bit and the new taste may need to be acquired. Also, making them healthier often changes the characteristics of the rolls - denser, less fluffy. Depending on where you as a baker and the tastes of your family, you may want to start with an easy, straight-up white bread roll as a baseline and then move out from there.

 

King Arthur has a Whole Grain cookbook.

[happi duck]

Soup is my favorite. I'm always surprised it isn't everyone's cup of...soup.

:)

 

Bisquits go well with soup and I think they are made by hand.

[madteaparty]

I found a bread machine at a garage sale once...in great condition.  But yes, people made bread long ago with no electricity.  Just hard work.  It can be done.  But I would keep an eye out on craigslist or garage sale for something to help you. 

 

my other issue is that I am a little insane about not using Teflon, and last time I looked, all bred machines contained this.

[fraidycat]

The only way I've ever made bread is by hand. My granny's dough recipe is 10 cups of flour, so lots of dough!

[umsami]

my other issue is that I am a little insane about not using Teflon, and last time I looked, all bred machines contained this.

 

Not sure if this helps, but I usually used my bread machine to mix/raise the dough, but would bake in "normal" pans.

[mamaraby]

Yes. You'll probably have better luck with a higher hydration dough and a lower amount of handling. It will take a bit more pre-planning, but it's worth it. :0)

 

In addition to the suggestions above, I'd also recommend Peter Reinhart's Craftsy class or his "Artisan Bread Everyday." My other favorite is called "Flour, Water, Salt, Yeast," but it's a bit more technical. The last one is all by hand. The other two use mixers, but include directions for by hand.

[prairiewindmomma]

I make soup bowls often. I do my final rise on parchment paper covered cookie sheets to make clean up easy. If I had a smaller family I would use my baking stone. (i need to buy a second one.)

 

To get a good mouth feel to my bread, I either do an egg white wash before baking or I rub on butter just out of the oven.

[applethyme]

Its very easy to make rolls from scratch without a bread machine or fancy mixer.  I have a 60 minute yeast roll recipe from my great grandmother that just takes a regular mixer and really you don't even have to have one. 

[Carol in Cal.]

Start with non-yeasted breads like cornbread.  You can even get a Marie Callendar's cornbread mix at Costco, which is super simple and reliably good.  It's awesome with soups or chili.

 

Yeasted breads--basically you knead the dough for about 10-15 minutes and get two loaves of bread from it.  20 minutes for 100% whole grain flours.  It's really not that hard.

 

I recommend this cookbook--Soup and Bread by Crescent Dragonwagon.

I also really, really like the soup recipes in the various Sunset French cookbooks.  The mushroom soup is particularly good.

You can find all of these cookbooks used on Amazon or Ebay.

 

[umsami]

Oh, I just remembered, I made these rolls from Kelsey's Essentials a few years ago and they were good and quick. I also did the cinnamon rolls as well. :)  We didn't have any sort of electric devices (Kitchen Aid, bread machine, etc.) at the time, and they turned out great.

 

http://www.cookingchanneltv.com/recipes/kelsey-nixon/rapid-rolls.html

[stripe]

The artisan bread book didn't work for me.

....

King Arthur has a Whole Grain cookbook.

My favorite of the Artisan Bread in 5min a day is the buttermilk bread, not the regular, but all their recipes are way too salty. You can get the main recipe (and the buttermilk) from the internet, no need to buy their book. Their own website has the recipe, as do many others, so it's not a secret.

 

King Arthur Flour also has a HUGE number of recipes for free on theie website. I've found them very reliable.

[GailV]

Ages ago I had a bread machine. I ditched it and had the kids knead the dough. They loved it.

 

Really, it's sort of relaxing to knead bread. It's sort of like playing with play dough, but smells better.

[Susan in TN]

In my case, no. Bread from scratch means going to the store and buying bread. It was made from scratch by someone and I am OK with that. :D

[plansrme]

Please keep in mind that even bread early on your learning curve is pretty good. Don't be intimidated by all of the excellent advice here. It is bread, not rocket science. Pull a recipe from a cookbook you already have and follow it. Don't love it? Try another next time. I am so glad that I started baking when I was a little kid and was too dumb to be scared.

[umsami]

Besides awesome free recipes, King Arthur Flour also has videos.  :)  

 

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/videos/baking-skills

[mamaraby]

Start with non-yeasted breads like cornbread. You can even get a Marie Callendar's cornbread mix at Costco, which is super simple and reliably good. It's awesome with soups or chili.

I was going to come back and suggest this - well not the mix, but quick breads. No need for yeast or fancy equipment. Mix and pour in a loaf pan. Still tasty, still bread. Biscuits (angel, drop, traditional) are also fantastic soup accompaniments. What about popovers? You could even buy yeast rolls in the freezer section that you can defrost and bake. Or La Brea bread. I think they might sell it at Costco, but I can also get it at the local grocery store.

[LostSurprise]

My favorite of the Artisan Bread in 5min a day is the buttermilk bread, not the regular, but all their recipes are way too salty. You can get the main recipe (and the buttermilk) from the internet, no need to buy their book. Their own website has the recipe, as do many others, so it's not a secret.

 

King Arthur Flour also has a HUGE number of recipes for free on theie website. I've found them very reliable.

 

There's too much yeast in their recipe, but it's pretty easy to manipulate to your taste. 

 

The KAF site is very reliable. 

 

 

There are quick bread recipes that work nicely and in under an hour. I like the Cooks Illustrated drop biscuits. Very quick and easy to make and great for breakfast sandwiches (or soup I'm sure). Not quite fresh loaf bread, but a good alternative in a short period of time.