Baking bread, should it be left to bakeries?

I’ve read a pile of books about bread now. I don’t think “intimidated” or “humbled” are the right words. After reading how fussy bread making can be, I got exasperated, justified in not doing it before, and unmotivated. 

In “Bread and How to Eat It”, Rick Easton says “Personally, I think people who bake bread at home are nuts. It’s time-consuming. It’s inefficient.” He includes bread recipes in his cookbook because the editors insisted, but most of the book is about how to use bread you bought from an artisanal bakery. Oh, and the bread recipe he gives makes you create your own starter instead of using yeast. Eye roll.

“Let’s bake bread!” by Bonnie Chara started out well, talking about teaching children to bake and using science concepts, but also was leaning a little “tradwife” for my taste.

In “Basics with Babish”, Youtube star Andrew Rea talks about screwing up. It’s a part of learning, it’s a part of life. His recipes have a little blurb about what could go wrong, which I think most recipes should have. Like warning labels. The recipe was still a bit much- and it asked for milk, which we didn’t have in the house.

Finally I went back to my standby book, the only cookbook I have used more than 6 recipes in, the one I keep going back to over and over, “The Family Fun Cookbook” from 1996. It has step-by-step pictures, uses volume instead of weight, doesn’t involve complicated ingredients, and doesn’t assume that you have any idea what you are doing. I wish there were more books like this. My shoulders unclenched. I thought about making pretzels, but decided to make a basic loaf instead. I think I might have put too much flour in, but the excess just didn’t incorporate. Mix, let rise, knead, shape, sit, bake. The bread came out bread-shaped, golden, smelled great. Fully cooked, tasted good. Not flavourful, since nothing was added, but a foundation. It met the approval of my husband and daughter. Other recipes in the book used the base recipe to make pretzels, a baguette and more. 

So my conclusion is- buy fancy bread. Make basic bread either in the bread machine or using simple ingredients and uncomplicated processes. Keep digging until you find the actual beginner information about a new hobby, not some artsy pretense at beginner information