Are you bread lover but you just can’t seem to find time to bake your own loaves? Well, you may have heard of the bread machine or even bought one to make things easier for you.
If you have tried to bake bread using this machine, then you probably know how annoying the kneading paddles are.
These paddles usually lodge themselves in the bread as it bakes and if you do not pull them out with care, they may damage your loaf or leave a huge, ugly hole.
Removing Paddle from The Bread Machine
Therefore, the big question is, when do you remove the paddles so that you can have your perfect loaf? Let us go through the baking process to see at which point this should be done shall we?
Set the Machine
The bread machine comes with several bake cycles so you want to set yours to the bread recipe you are making and start it.
Now, your machine’s manual may have specified how long it kneads before it begins to bake but if not, you want to watch and see.
One of the best times to remove the paddles is before the second rise of your bread dough. This will ensure that the paddles do not keep poking at your bread as it bakes.
Remove Kneaded Dough
Once your machine stops kneading, you want to remove the dough and transfer it to a bowl. Cover the bowl to prevent the dough from drying.
It is at this point when you should detach the kneading paddles from the machine and they should come off easily.
Pick any dough remnants and add them to the dough you had earlier transferred to a bowl. Put the dough back in the machine and start the bake cycle. You should have a perfect loaf in the end.
Note: Removing the paddles from your machine prior to baking does not mean that your bread will not have any holes. Remember that it is impossible to remove the rods where the paddles mount and these will still poke your bread while it bakes.
Your only consolation is that the holes created by the rods will not be as ugly as those poked by the kneading paddles.
Tip
Never remove the paddles before they have they have done their job of kneading the bread dough. Although, they leave holes on your loaf, they do have an important job.
Should you do that, the ingredients will not be blended together and what you will end up with is a baked mess; not bread.
Final Thoughts
When it comes to the bread machine, you can either love it or hate it. There is no middle ground. Most people love the aroma and taste of freshly baked bread but hate the unsightly holes that the kneading paddles in the machine leave on bread.
Although it is impossible to have a completely hole-free loaf after using this machine, you can remove the paddles just before the second rising or final rising of your bread dough.
This means that you will end up with a decent loaf but it may have some holes at the bottom.