My brother often uses his bread machine to start pizza dough. He makes bread for his family all the time. It's a real time- and money-saver. I don't have any tips or tricks, just congratulations; if you actually use it all the time, a breadmaker is awesome.

I'll ask him if he has any recipes/tricks.

My girlfriend once asked me, "What is your favorite smell, or aroma?" My response was a bakery. A few months later I got a bread machine on my birthday.

The possibilities are limited only by your creativity. Even the ready made boxes of bread mix can be enhanced with spices and herbs as you mentioned.

I'm a big fan of wheat bread, so I do this one a lot. It's called Dakota bread. For a 1 1/2 pound loaf:

1 1/4 cups water
2 tablespoons canola oil
2 tablespoons honey

2 1/4 cups bread flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup raw bulger cracked wheat
2 teaspoons gluten
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 cup raw sunflower seeds
1/4 cup raw pumpkin seeds, chopped
2 teaspoons sesame seeds
1 1/4 teaspoons poppy seeds

2 teaspoons SAF yeast or 2 1/2 teaspoons
bread machine yeast

Occasionally I'll mix in a touch of oregano or parsley. If you like a pop now and then, a hint of cayenne pepper powder will freshen your sinuses.

Have fun. I know you'll love it.

I use it to mix flour tortilla dough - the ratio is different, 3 cups mix to 1 cup hot water.

I've also used it to mix playdough for the kids.

It's really good for making your own butter. Let whipping cream or half and half get to room temp, then pour it in and set on the dough setting until it separates. Some creams don't acutally separate - Land O' Lakes did that to me. Very confusing, but once it cooled it was pretty good sweet butter.

The recipe book that came with it (that I've now lost) says that I can make jam with mine, but I've never tried.

Speaking of the French bread - we've put in cut up pieces of smoked turkey and extra sharp cheddar cheese - it wasn't light or fluffy, but boy it tasted good. If you add it early in the process the stuff gets beat up pretty good and distributed all over, so there are no unpleasant chunks.

Oh - on the egg whites for the crust, I finally just got a powder mix - it does the job just as well

I've also got a recipe for whole wheat honey bread, but I don't remember the proportions offhand. About how many cups of flour do the basic recipes call for on your unit?

For my machine, the one pound loaf seems to be three to four cups of flour...depending on other ingredients.

Great tips - and that recipe sounds awesome, netbros.