You can't possibly know that for certain. There's been quite a bit in the press in the last couple of years about the very lax labelling and advertising laws when it comes to the supermarkets' claims of 'freshly baked bread, made on the premises'. They might not necessarily bring in frozen or part-baked loafs, but the actual dough is often made elsewhere, packed with additives and then shipped to supermarkets. That is not freshly baked bread. Supermarkets are very tight-lipped when it comes to divulging exactly how they make their bread.

This makes for interesting reading.

http://www.sustainweb.org/pdf/are_su...mers_pants.pdf

Can't I?

But you are wrong because I DO know for certain. In my local supermarket, the bloomers, tinned bread, french sticks and buns/baps are all made and baked fresh with bags of flour on premises

I love Warburtons Crusty, there's no other bread for me. Texture, taste, smell; it's got them all. Reminds me of the Rathbones half baked uncut loaf that I used to buy in the 80s.

Brush the bread with milk when you remove from the oven will soften the crust, or a dusting of flour prior to baking will do the same

I used to work for ASDA in a local superstore and all the bread we sold apart from the organic loaves at the time were baked fresh instore, I know because I made it.
Yes additives were added, which these were the seasoning and a dough improver. These were added as we couldn't have kept up with demand without the dough improver, as this reduced the production time by removing 1 stage of the prove. Even then from making the dough to the baked product was still about 3 hours.

While there are plenty that disagree to the use of dough improvers, they are just salt, sugar, milk powder, vegetable oil and ascorbic acid (vit c). Which most recipe's call for all of the above except the ascorbic acid anyway!

We have a panasonic bread maker.

I always use alinson bread flour and the french bread loaf recipe in the book that came with the bread maker.

Nice bread, perfect every time, makes great toast.

Put a baking tin, a deep one that you would use for roasting into the bottom of the oven. Let it heat up before you are ready to bake your bread. When you put your bread in throw a cup of water in the tin.

Also make sure you slash the top of your loaves to let the dough expand, this helps the crust to be thinner.

The water you mention will turn to steam (or that's the plan) this in turn gives increased lift to the dough in the initial rise when it first goes in the oven, steam also makes the crust, crustier.

The slashing is just for decoration. As unless your bread is proved in the open air, the crust is formed in the oven while baking

From what I heard, home made bread does not last very long due to the lack of preservatives that are put in retail bread.

It doesn't last very long because it's so nice you eat it quickly

My home-made bread lasts 4 or 5 days. By the end it's not good for sandwiches, but OK for toast and maybe soup.

I tend to use cheap flour. Sometimes that has Ascorbic Acid in it.

I am currently addicted to M&S San Franscisco sourdough.

Steam gives my bread a very thin crispy crust. Perhaps I did not make myself clear. I personally like a bit of crisp but if you want it really soft put the bread in a tub or a bag after cooling.

Talking about sliced bread,

Its not meant to last long, it should be eated fresh.

I thought they baked them fresh from frozen actually if there is such a thing.

You were talking about supermaket bread, one would assume that you meant supermarket bakerys?

Why not just clarify what you meant? Supermarket bakerys also do sliced bread. Warburtons sliced bread isn't frozen either, so what were you actually talking about?

Some do, others actually make the dough on the premises.

I learnt to make bread when I was at school (app 54y ago) but have never been able to do it again and I DO have a bread maker which has NEVER produced a decent loaf. They turn out really heavy and hard..fed up with trying now! ..

Panasonic bread maker does it for me.

I've got a Murphy Richards breadmaker and never had a bad loaf out of it. ***

I make plain white or wholemeal bread from scratch, but use a bread mix for more interesting bread. Mine only lasts a couple of days, but that could be because I keep it wrapped in a tea towel (I have a couple especially for the purpose - not the same ones I use for washing up!)

I'm a bit peed off actually, because I can't seem to find the Wrights Sunflower bread mix anywhere, and it is rather addictive.

*** I've just remembered that I did once have a bad loaf. It came out like a very flat slab of concrete. This taught me not to make bread when drunk, because you're bound to cock up how much yeast you put in and which programme you use
Last edited by HollyC : 25-02-2013 at 21:04

I find all varieties of Vogel's bread tasty especially when toasted.

Soya and Linseed, and Oat and Wholemeal are my two current favourites and they're quite often on offer at around £1.

My one gripe is that they're often stacked (or baked?) in a way that means the slices break horizonally, which means you end up with unintentioned huge toast soldiers.

We buy medium Kingsmill 50/50 and it makes lovely toast. We've always bought sliced bread and I don't think I've ever encountered mouldy bread in my entire life - but then we always have a loaf eaten within 2-3 days tops, and freeze it as soon as it's delivered/bought.

Ormo soda bread for toasting and their potato bread is great for fried breakfasts.

From mixes? Or properly? Do you know which ones actually bake from fresh (NOT mixes)?