Nothing fancy, just a reminder that the best things in life are easy and cheap(er)!
Homemade basic white bread machine loaf, whipped butter with fresh minced garlic, dried italian seasoning and salt. Gently kissed at 350 until the butter melts into the bread, finished on a low broil until your favorite shade of brown.
While I wholeheartedly agree that homemade is cheaper and better.
It hard to beat middle night unplanned throw in my premade grocery frozen garlic bread into the oven.
This.
Homemade during normal hours and sobriety, no contest
Getting home pissed at 3am? a frozen garlic baguette from Tesco is possibly the ultimate food
The rules absolutely do not apply to 3 am drunk binges. There are no rules.
69¢ day old bread at Walmart. Half a stick of butter or a mix of butter and olive oil. Granulated garlic, maybe some dried parsley. $1 for all you can eat garlic bread for cheaper than the soybean oil freeze loaf.
Store bought is always better - I can’t bring myself to add enough butter to match what they do
The best flavors come from people who don’t care about your long term health.
The best flavor comes from those who care about flavor more than your long term health. Those who just don’t care about your health make tasteless cheap garbage that looks like food but lacks taste or texture. (it might or might not smell good - they have heard that taste is mostly smell and think smell is all it is) Just look at fast food.
Yeah, that’s what I meant. No one thinks macca’s makes that food because they care about flavor or your health, they care about money.
How true that is!
You might want to check the label!
If it’s 100% butter and it’s not like 8 bucks a loaf, I’ll eat my digital hat.
I do agree there’s no way I’d add enough butter to emulate the store bought stuff.
I’m sure it’s not actual butter, but either way the goal is to not look at the label.
When I make it myself I do prefer butter but never enough to match what they do
A good olive oil is good too. Different from butter, but good.
I like your recipe but I’ll cop to buying garlic bread from the grocery when I really feel like paying to not have to use the oven for yet another thing today.
I may have been exaggerating just a bit!
But how are you heating up that store bought bread?? Or do you have pre cooked garlic bread where you are??? (Serious question)
Ah I was confused when I wrote that, you still need to bake it but it just becomes one less thing to worry about timing to have it complete with the rest of the meal.
You have to time the store bought bread, no? 😂
I’m not trying to be a jerk! But I’m thinking maybe it’s more the extra steps involved? Of those, baking and slicing a homemade loaf and chopping garlic are the two most cumbersome steps.
If so, use a store bought pre sliced loaf (0 extra time) whatever is cheap. Invest in a garlic press (pays for itself with cheaper garlic breads) and use that to quickly pulverize garlic directly into the butter (30 seconds, let’s call it 90 to be generous and account for getting rid of the peel, etc), the Italian seasoning and salt is literally seconds of work. Mash for like 8 seconds.
Spread on bread. If the butter is nice and soft (sub tub margarine for convenience if you can accept the tradeoff in flavor, or are vegan… it mixes easily) you can do this in 90 seconds as well.
Let’s round to 200 seconds. 3 min, 20 sec and you’re now at the same point convenience-wise as store bought, uncooked garlic bread. And while the store bought loaf will still cost you at least 6x more than baking a loaf, you’ll still come out a bit ahead cost wise. Fresh garlic makes the biggest difference here though.
Bonus:
- easy for kids to make and they generally love it
- makes your house smell amazing…premade always has some kind of sour smell, I’m guessing citric acid to preserve the garlic (like the red headed step-child of home cooking…jarlic.)
- bread excluded, you know exactly what’s going in your body and where it came from
And this isn’t all directed at you specifically! Just a friendly nudge to all potential home cooks.
I can make frozen garlic bread in 10 minutes and still help my kids with their homework/break up any fights/whatever duties I have tonight. Unless your time is worthless homemade isn’t really cheaper. But it is better
I don’t personally consider food preparation to be a time expense in my life, but absolutely if time is that tight for whatever reason, fill your boots.
You are on a cooking discussion group though, and presumably if you don’t have time for a few minutes of work (see: my shortcut comment above), you don’t have time for any cooking whatsoever??
Making garlic butter is the easiest thing there is. It’s butter, crushed garlic, Parmesan, a little oregano if you want. Smash it together and Bob’s your uncle.
I usually see parsley used for the green flecks in it. Doesn’t really affect the flavor; it’s there purely for the aesthetic. Oregano might taste pretty good tho. Imma have to try that.
One thing that definitely elevates a garlic butter, though, is roasting the garlic first. You can even just use the garlic as butter after that, since it will release the oils and becomes spreadable all by itself.
Can you guys stop talking dirty around me I’m at work
Are bread machines worth it? I’ve always considered one but im just not sure if it’s worth it. Is it still a lot of work to make a loaf?
That is a matter of opinion. A bread machine that you can figure out how to program correctly means you dump some stuff in before going to bed and have fresh bread in the morning. Some people love this.
Personally I say no. I prefer to mix my sour dough by hand and bake it in a dutch oven with charcoal… Once in a while I cheat I put it in the electric oven which is easier. This is not hard, but I need to be at home for a full day since it needs to be kneaded, punched down, then get up early to bake it before my shower. You should not be surprised that I sometimes skip the gram measurements of a scale and just dump things into the bowl until it “feels right”. (but I fully endorse the implication of the other comment that you should throw away your measuring cups/spoons - either go by weight or by feel: bulk measures are worthless).
Yeeesss! Tell me about your dutch oven approach…preheat the pot in the fire, right? Parchment paper or no? How long total do you run your fire? Do you monitor temps or go by feel? So many questions!
I don’t preheat the pot. I do cheat and use charcoal briquettes, which means I can look up how many briquettes to make the proper temperature and put those on my oven. reheat the pot. I have to cook a few minutes longer to make up for lack of pre-heat.
I never use parchment paper for baking bread. The bread needs to break at hotter temperatures where parchment paper will burn. It doesn’t work even when I use my electric of an inside. Bread needs to bake at hotter temperatures than paper will burn at and I’ve had bad luck with it. I also find that bread releases from metal just fine, but doesn’t release from parchment paper.
100% yes and I’ll tell you why (edit: 100% yes worth it)
I had the same frustrations years ago when I first tried them. This is how you do it:
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Buy a nice digital kitchen scale. Forget your cups and tablespoons. You’re working with grams now. Dabble with recipes that appeal to you. Trial and error. Once you nail it, that’s your recipe from now on. The scale keeps it consistent every time. Game changer.
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Buy a good bread knife. And resist the temptation to slice until it’s cooled. You’ll get better and better and suddenly you’re making beautiful sandwiches with your clean slices.
Those two things will eliminate what I think the main frustrations are with bread machines: inconsistency and cutting issues.
Edit 2: WHEAT GLUTEN!! If your loaves are not chewy enough and just kind of mush, add straight wheat gluten. I have 15g in my personal recipe due to using half white all purpose flour… replaces some of the gluten missing from that.
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Check out Ina Garten’s “outrageous garlic bread.” Truly a feat of deliciousness.
