Prepping In Secret.com

I have one shelf in my cupboard that holds 200 loaves of bread! Obvioulsy not baked but in their raw form – Flour, Olive Oil, Salt & Yeast.

Not all prepping scenarios require keeping a stash of long term wheat berries in Mylar bags and milling them by hand to make simple baked goods! Keeping a good supply of basic ingredients can supply you for a year and cover you for any number of problematic scenarios.

Bread Makers? There ain’t no bread makers in the apocalypse son!

No I agree, using bread makers in a long term grid down scenario is probably not an option! Before that, the myriad of unleavened breads are by far better options, flat breads, pittas, tortillas and chapatis are all much more sensible. But in this blog post I’m suggesting that a bread makers is a useful addition to your toolkit that makes every day life better and improves your family’s health and resilience to supply chain issues.

Let’s imagine a scenario where industrial action, a fuel shortage or cyber attack on payments systems means that going to the shop to pick up bread isn’t an option. Now imagine this scenario lasts days or weeks – it certainly would be a problem.

A bread maker isn’t the one-fit all solution, but it’s an invaluable tool in your arsenal! I’ve hand made bread and whilst fun in its own way, the novelty soon wears off and I’m glad of the labour saving properties of the Morphy Richard’s Fastbake machine that I have.

I combine the ingredients before I go to bed (about 2-3min) and set the machine to bake the bread ready for the morning. I have sufficient flour yeast and oil for around 200 loaves at any given time.

During “normal times” there’s nothing like the smell of fresh bread in the morning and knowing that it’s tastier and healthier than store bought bread is a great piece of mind. Have you ever looked at the ingredients on shop bought bread? It’s like a chemistry experiment!

My go to Bread Maker Recipe

This is for the Morphy Richard’s FastBake on the “Large Loaf” Setting. Put the bread Tin on the scales and Tare the Scales:

• 300g Water (Then Tare Scale)
• 9g Salt (Then Tare Scale)
• 45g Olive Oil (Then Tare Scale)
• 485g Strong White Bread Flour
• Top up to 525g with strong Wholemeal Bread Flour
• 3Tsp Quick Acting Yeast (approx 8g)

I have this process down to a fine art and it takes about 2-3min max. I reckon I could get it sub 1min if the pressure was on. Using scales is essential for a quick process rather than faffing with measuring jugs.

Set the timer if using overnight, or just press start – bread will be ready in about 3hrs. I find that the bread that has been made overnight tastes better and has better texture. It doesn’t take any longer to cook but I reckon the fact that the flour has been sat on top of the water for 4-5hours starts some kind of Autolysing which improves the texture.

It’s foolproof, healthy and delicious! I understand, that this isn’t a one fit all scenario, but in my mind this is the very nature of Prepping In Secret – Simple changes you can make to your life that makes every day better (Fresh healthy bread!) that gives you “cover” for a serious preps – almost a year’s worth of bread (assuming you have power). If not, you have probably two years worth of tortillas!

I’ll revisit this topic again with a video in the future. But for now, stay prepared Secret Preppers!