Oatmeal Raisin Bread Machine Bread

I found this recipe quite by accident. I had tucked it away in one of my many recipe files so long ago I can’t quite remember when and it literally fell out when I was looking for something else. I’m almost sure I heard it whisper ‘make me’…

The original recipe is from the only brand of flour my Mom used to buy when I was growing up in Canada – Robin Hood. It was from one of their special magazine inserts. I used to look out for them on visits home, and my Mom never minded me ‘borrowing’ them. Even though I couldn’t buy Robin Hood flour in the UK, I liked to make their recipes anyway.

Oatmeal raisin anything is guaranteed to please in our house and the idea of a bread I could make quickly in my machine was simply too appealing to pass up. So while I was making the other recipe I had actually been looking for, I threw the ingredients for this bread in my bread machine and hoped for the best.

I did change the recipe around a bit. As I didn’t have any whole wheat flour on hand, I used all white flour. I reduced the salt by half, switched out the margarine for some olive oil, and also bumped up the cinnamon, doubling the quantity called for. We like cinnamon in our house too, almost as much as oatmeal raisin anything.

Oh my this bread was good. It tasted great warm spread with butter, and even better toasted. In fact, it was so good, I had to make another loaf the next day! This recipe is definitely a keeper.

Oatmeal Raisin Bread Machine Bread

Adapted from a recipe by Robin Hood Flour
Makes one large loaf.

1⅓ cups water
2 tablespoons vegetable oil (I used mild olive oil)
3 cups strong white flour (white bread flour)
(recipe calls for 1½ cups white and 1½ cups whole wheat)
⅔ cup oats (not instant)
½ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons packed brown sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons fast acting yeast
¾ cup raisins (I used a bit less than this as the raisin dispenser on my bread machine won’t hold quite that much.)

Add the ingredients to your bread machine bucket according to your manufacturer’s directions – or try mine. Although it isn’t the one called for by my bread machine, I like to use this method:

Put the water in the bread machine bucket. Add the oil.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, oats, salt, sugar and cinnamon. Pour on top of the water.

Put the yeast on top of this mixture, sort of mounded up in the centre.

Put the bucket in the machine, and add the raisins to your raisin dispenser. (If you don’t have a dispenser, add the raisins part way through the bread making process, signalled by most bread machines with the ‘raisin beep’.)

Set the bread machine to the appropriate setting for a white bread loaf with raisins. I like to choose the ‘light’ crust setting for this bread.

When your bread machine signals the loaf is done, remove it from the machine, and then from the bread maker bucket, allowing it to cool on a wire rack for as long as you can resist cutting it.

Shared with Saturday Dishes