Water and the Bread Machine
Last Updated on June 11, 2020
I moved to a new house in 2014. You can bet that one of the first things I unpacked was my bread machine! I happily began making bread in my new kitchen.
However, a few weeks later, I noticed that my hamburger buns weren’t turning out quite right. The dough was incredibly sticky and really unpleasant to handle. The buns tasted fine, but the texture was a little strange.
The first few batches I’d made at the new house were normal, but suddenly no matter what I did they weren’t quite right.
I was having no problems at all with my sour milk bread. The bread tasted and looked great.
Why was I only having problems sometimes?
I couldn’t figure it out at first. The flour and yeast were the same. The only actual difference was the liquid. One recipe used milk and the other used water.
That was the answer! The problem was the water!
My neighborhood gets its water from a well. The water is usually untreated. No chlorine. No fluoride. There are no additives. It’s just water pumped out of the ground.
However, the system had undergone annual maintenance. As a part of that, the water tower was treated with chlorine. I realized that the chlorine in the water must have been killing the yeast.
I proved my theory by buying some bottled water and using that in the recipe instead. Yep! The hamburger buns came out perfectly!
The problem persisted for about a month. After that, I switched back to using tap water in my bread machine recipes.
This answered my ? too! I was wondering same if I could use Spring water in my machine. Great article. Thank you.
I’m so glad it helped!
I use a carbon filter for my drinking water, but sometimes just use non-filtered tap water so I don’t need to heat it. I do have a problem with soggy bread sometimes, so I’ve gone to adding much less water. That helps quite a bit.
I only make gluten free breads from mixes, and eggs from flax and chia, not regular eggs. It’s surprising that it ever works at all, but sometimes is quite good, though bread with gluten is always better.
I’d like a little clarity. You said the problem persisted for about a month and then you switched back to using tap water. As the buns turned out perfectly when you used bottled water, proving that the well water was causing your problem, why did you switch back? Isn’t your well water still chlorinated?
My tap water comes from Lake Mead, next to Las Vegas, NV and it is very “hard”. Bottled water makes much better bread for me.
Good point! I’ve edited the article to hopefully make it more clear.
Usually, our water gets no treatment at all. It’s tested on a regular basis so we know it’s safe.
I have recently moved and I have noticed that the bread rises beautifully but when it is baking the top of the bread sinks. I haven’t changed anything except the water. Your article makes me wonder if tap water is the problem. Where I used to live I had my own well and here I have city water. Do you think the water could be the problem? I’m going to try bottled water.