About the milks...
- Adoptedbyachicken is right about the delay cycle. Bread machine recipes often call for powdered milk so that you can use the delayed cycle. Regular milk could sour or spoil if left sitting on the delay cycle until the desired start time.
- milk vs water does change the product...both the texture and the crumb. The fats in milk make a softer product as Scoop mentioned. This is why many bread recipes (machine type or not) call for some milk, and some water.
- Also agree with Maizey that you can throw off the wet/dry ingredient ratio by making a straight substitution of water for milk or vice versa.
What's all that really mean in a bread machine?
- In a bread machine substitutions and exact measurements are important because the machine cannot make judgement calls and adjustments like you do when kneading by hand, timing the rise based on what you see visually, adjustments to baking time, etc.
- Because of that, bread machine loaves will more readily sink, have shrunken tops, poor texture, or over/under brown if measurements aren't accurate.
All that said, I DO substitute powdered milk and regular milk all the time in both bread machine recipes and 'by-hand' recipes. However, it's important to get the ratio correct.
Any given amount of powdered milk + water is the equivalent of a measured amount of regular milk. So, you want to figure out that equivalent, substitute that much regular milk, and then add any remaining volume in water.
Here's a powdered milk conversion chart. (Came from this blog:
http://everydayfoodstorage.net/f/powdered-milk)
So, let's work through an example. Suppose your recipe calls for
2 Tbl powdered milk
1 cup water
Looking at the chart, the 2 Tbl powdered milk would be mixed with 2/3 cup water - making the equivalent of 2/3 cup regular milk. So I would use 2/3 cup regular milk AND 1/3 cup water.
Hope this is helpful.
edit: fix chart link
....and I've also used many brands of powdered milk. I cannot tell any difference. I purchase based on price.
