Bread-baking bowls

So I'm about a year and a half late to the homemade bread-making party, but better late than never, right? For whatever reason I just wasn't really interested at the beginning of the pandemic while the rest of the world was discovering it and tweeting about it. I don't know why; it's not like it's a foreign concept to me – my parents had and used a bread-making machine while I was growing up – but I think the only bread I've baked myself was the time I made the Berke family pretzel recipe.  

Up until this past week, that is! I recently discovered a nifty device for helping with bread-making, and it's such a simple idea it's a surprise I hadn't heard of it before. It's essentially a silicone bowl by a company called Lékué, which allows you to do all the steps within it: mixing, kneading, rising, and baking. Yep, just pop it in the oven to bake at the end (no need to transfer to another container), or in my case I just use my combination microwave/convection oven/air fryer. I made some bread using one of the recipes that came with the bowl this week, and for not having done it before it came out splendidly.

That's the bowl on the left.

I've now baked a second loaf, and can hardly wait to try out more recipes. The ones that come with the bowl are pretty small, but it could easily hold a more “normal” sized loaf, so that's something to experiment with in the future. It's great to have the smell of fresh bread wafting through the house, and I'm looking forward to baking a lot bread in years to come. A hui hou!