Oster 2 lb. Bread Maker

I've owned a bread maker in that past and wasn't too happy with the quality of the bread that came out. It may have been the baker though. I bought this after looking at some recipes online, many of which were fantastic sounding bread recipes. All of them were made in a bread machine. This was the only one left at my local Walmart and I got it for only $25 today. I brought it home and was surprised at all the features it offered. After reading the book thoroughly I tried the Basic White Bread recipe. It worked beautifully and the end product is one of the most beautiful loaves of bread I've ever made. It is shaped beautifully and the crust turned out a light golden brown which is exactly what I wanted. I think the key to this is to add the ingredients exactly as specified in the instruction manual. I don't believe I was that careful with my old bread maker which may be why my bread was always gummy looking. This bread is light and has a wonderful texture. The paddle does leave a small hole in the bread but it's not really that noticeable. The aroma is outstanding and the hardest part was waiting for it to bake and cool before trying a bite. I didn't have any problem with the pan coming loose during the kneading process and because I put the dry ingredients in a hill in the center I didn't have any flour left on the sides either. The loaf was shaped nicely and did not fall in the middle during the baking process as others have complained about. This machine is also a lot quieter than my older machine and looks great on my counter top. The baking pan came out easily and my loaf slid out onto the cooling rack without any problem. The pan does get very hot so be careful when removing it from the bread machine. I'm very happy with the quality of the machine and the pan. I also noticed that the blade is metal. My old machine had a plastic blade. I have a feeling this is going to be used a lot and I'm already thinking of some great breads I can make for Christmas presents.

So far I've only used this to make dough and have yet to use it to bake the bread, so I've not really put this bread maker to it's full use. But for my purposes, it's done a great job, worked very well, the price is reasonable, and I like it that it is not huge. I can store it in the cabinet and just take it out when I need to use it. It is also fairly light which is nice. Not sure how it compares to other models since this is the only one I've had recently. The only other breadmaker I've had was from many many years ago and it was huge and was quite a clunker, so that is the only thing I have to compare it to.