I’ll be honest: the Brød and Taylor Folding Proofer was not something I thought I particularly had to have. When I needed to keep my dough or starter snug and warm, I had been content with makeshift “proofing boxes”: the oven with the light on, the top of my stove under the range hood lights, or a big plastic bag with a frequently-changed bowl of warm water.
But now that I have one, I’m over makeshift. The Brød and Taylor Folding Proofer is a tool that does one thing, does it well and without a fuss, and makes my baking life easier. It’s hard to ask for more than that from your equipment, isn’t it?
Plug it in, set the temperature, nestle your fermenting dough or proofing loaf inside its cozy incubator, and rest easy. Your dough will be well-cared-for at a consistent temperature, even if the temperature in your kitchen is not very bread-friendly. And constant temperatures make for more predictable proofing times. That’s good news if you’re a control freak, or if you just like your bread to turn out well.
The proofer has a roomy, collapsible design. It has an 18 x 14.5-inch footprint and folds down to less than 3 inches thick for compact storage. The interior dimensions are 15 x 12.5 x 8.5 inches, which can accommodate a quarter-sheet pan, most 12-cup muffin pans, two or three loaf pans or oval brotforms, or two round brotforms of up to 8 inches in diameter. I can create a second layer for additional loaves by stacking two 12-inch square baking pans with Sklips. I do wish the proofer were just a skosh larger, to take a half-sheet pan (13 x 18 inches).
The operation of the box couldn’t be simpler: plug it in and set the temperature you want (70F – 120F). To keep the dough from drying out, you’ll probably want to add some humidity with the included water tray.
Brød And Taylor’s website offers some ideas for other uses of the proofer besides proofing dough: making yogurt, warming dinner plates, softening butter, melting and tempering chocolate. I’ll add starting and maintaining a wild yeast starter (and especially the sweet starter for your holiday panettone). What else could you do?
Now here’s even more great news: The generous people at Brød And Taylor have a proofer waiting for a lucky one of you. The details:
- To enter, leave a comment on this post about why you love baking (or why you want to learn).
- The winner will be randomly drawn by me at approximately 9 A. M. PDT on Saturday, March 31, 2012.
- One comment per person please.
- The proofer can ship to a continental U.S. address only.
- Full disclosure: Brød And Taylor gave me a proofer to review and keep. I received no other compensation.
Baking is both a pleasure and a challenge… smiles all around are the reward. What’s not to love?
I love baking bread as I enjoy the feel of the dough under my fingers as I knead it and I love eating the finished products. I love baking cakes because I am almost addicted to sweets; I love baking cookies because they are small and I feel less guilty about eating the sweet stuff. As for pies, let’s not go there.
There is n o t h i n g like the taste, texture and smell of home-baked bread! Every loaf is a surprise and I never tire of trying new recipes – success or failure! I can’t explain why I love to bake bread so much, but what I do know is that it’s an ephemeral experience that is repeated with each new day or loaf. Surely, God gave us the sense of smell for bread and the herbs and ingredients that go into it!
i think i like baking because it connects me to a long line of men and women around the world and back into time…simply water, flour, salt…time,fire, and friends…
it is ancient and new all at once. Thank you for all that you share and teach…
I love baking because it’s a good stress releaser . When I’m baking I get to create, like an artist with a paint brush. It very relaxing.
I like baking because its a break from the hustle and bustle of life. I like feeling the dough come together under my hands, and I like being an active participant in the food I consume. Thanks for your work on this website…
I love making bread. My four daughters love to eat it. My large dogs LOVE bread as well, so I dare not leave any where they can reach it. Only the top of the refrigerator is safe (a Newfy and a St. Bernard/black Lab Mutt). Thank you for all the inspiration that you have give me!!!
I learnt to bake bread from my grandmother and have passed this pleasure on to my daughter. Its a gift I hope will continue to be passed on from generation to generation The smell of fresh baked bread is simply beyond comparison. It brings such joy!
I keep trying… sometimes with terrific success other times with a lump that just looks up at me from the counter (made a wonderful carmalized onion, goat cheese and herb pizza with that one). It is always a challenge, something new, something good. From croissants to bagels, I am always “looking for the world’s best sticky bun”.
Thanks.
I’m all about makeshift too but my home is simply too cold to get my dough to proof. Bread baking means so much to me. Turning such simple ingredients into a loaf of bread is almost like alchemy.
I love baking because it seems to stop time and it makes life feel simpler.
. . .because it results in things that I can eat and enjoy.
I so want this! I have never made my own starter and since my house is always around 60F I didn’t think I could. Until now……
Baking is in my genes I think. My paternal Bohemian grandmother was a professional cook & I still use her bread board for kneading. That continuity is just one of the things I love about baking bread.
I love baking because I get to have so much fun making things and then I get to see my friends and family have so much fun eating the things I make!
I love baking because it smells good, tastes good and my food doesn’t have any weird ingredients!
Smells of baking bring back good memories for me while creating new ones for others.
Once I made my own sourdough starter from scratch, I became obsessed with sourdough baking. I feel a connection with the past as I use wild yeast dough to make the best tasting bread imaginable. I make bread every weekend. Since my house is very cold, I have to expect extra long proofing times. A proofing box would be heaven in my sourdough kitchen.
Since I started baking bread some months ago, the only bread my family eats is the one I make. Once a week I spend many hours making different kinds of breads that I slice and then freeze. Everybody enjoys the home-make breads a lot!
Few things in life can surpass the supreme satisfaction of seeing flour,water,yeast,salt tourn into a wonderful loaf of bread
Few things in the world can surpass the supreme satisfaction from flour,yeast,water,salt turning into a great loaf of bread!
I love baking because I love food. 🙂
I’ve been baking bread for 30 years and I just love to see the faces of family and friends light up when I deliver their loaves. Um, not to mention the fact that I love to eat it too.
I love baking because it is pure magic! Flour + salt + yeast + water = life!
I love baking because it is my time to get lost in what I am doing, it’s my version of video games. It calms me, it restores me and after I’m done it fills my belly with yummy-ness!
Homemade bread? Fresh from the oven? Heavenly!
Baking sourdough bread especially, but any kind of bread really, is my way of being creative, of relaxing, and of trying new things. The reward of fresh, warm, delicious bread is pretty nice, too.
After years of baking bread in a cold, cold kitchen…it would be a delight to dispense with heating pads, towels and rubber bands and comfort my dear little yeast cells in a warm, cozy cloche;-)
I love baking bread. I love giving it away. I love the magic of yeast.
Baking allows me to spend some wonderful time with my son and daughter making homemade memories.
Thanks for your blog
I love baking! I’ve been doing it for 6 months, am horrible at it, but thoughts of a perfect loaf are still egging me on! I can’t stop! 😀
1. Bread is sustenance. 2. Bread is love. 3. Bread is art. 4. Bread is science. 5. Bread is ritual. 6. Bread is pleasure. 7. Bread is life and lessons about life. For me, baking bread is discipline, gratitude, and joy.
I enjoy sitting in my lawn chair in front of the wood fired oven with sourdough steam seeping through the cracks in the door. Kids, chickens, and woodpeckers hovering around to see what smells so good. I like that my family says it is the finest bread they have ever had. A proof that is predictable would be a nice addition to my baking day. Blue skies, thanks for the work you put into your web site and email list.
I love baking, and especially bread. I love the feeling and the satisfaction of creating something wonderful from start to finish and to see people enjoy it. Thanks for the chance to win this proofer!!!
Bread baking fully engages my mind and my hands. Mastering the variables of this “simple” miracle: flour, water, yeast; is a joy.
Bringing pleasure to family, friends and myself with the taste of home baked goods is a true reward.
Baking is extremely relaxing and therapeutic!
I loke baking! I am a student at a culinary school now and recently had a teacher who turned me onto bread baking! I love it!
I love baking’s smells and tastes and creating something out of (usually) simple ingredients.
Since I was a child I have always enjoyed baking. I think it’s the creative aspect that interests me. My fondest memories of baking have been those I have shared with my children and grandchildren.
I love to make and eat bread!! And also share it with others. Recently I donated 2 silent actions donations to my school. One was making pretzels with ms. Sonia for kids. The other was a bread of the month. A different bread made each month to a well deserving family!!
I love baking! Honestly don’t know why, but I really do! Most of the time I have to give it away, because I definitely can’t eat that much stuff! 😛
what a marvelous addition to a cool kitchen! goodbye to all that hot water under the pan stuff. Love cinnamon rolls and raisin bread.
I love to give things to our neighbors. It is so fun to make something, taste a little and pass it along to those that are too busy to bake. This proofer would be wonderful. Thanks for the opportunity.
I love the whole process…and to eat bread
I love baking because of the pleasusure it gives me to bake, and then, the added benefit is that our family gets to enjoy the baked goods. It is perfect.
I was raised by my grandmother and she always had fresh baked rolls or bread. I was the only one in the family that could make fresh bread like her. The smell of bread rising and baking excites the family to hurry and gather in kitchen every time.
I would love to have a proofer. My kitchen varies from cold in the winter to hot in the summer so my bread rising improvisations are many. I make nearly all our bread–I love the feel of kneading the dough and the smell of baking bread.
I teach kids to bake bread. What could be better or more joyous than that revelation when the shaggy or gooey autolysed dough turns supple and lively under their hands? It’s sometimes tricky to manage having dough in three stages ready for them (just mixed, autolysed, proofed and ready to bake) but I do it that way because our time is limited and it’s so important to feel it as it goes along. I like to think I’m inoculating the kids with my yeast culture =)
Someone with a real love of bread must have invented this proofer for the rest of the world to enjoy. They knew that conditions are not always right for a person to proof bread.
Now, no matter the conditions of the weather outside or in your home, delicious homemade bread can finally be accomplished for all to enjoy. And there’s no more rewarding feeling than making the perfect bread. Now it can be accomplished easily with no excuses accepted. Bread from the grocery store is “bagged air” as our priest once said in his homily. I agree. With homemade bread you know what is in the bread and you offer it to your family lovingly. Thank you to whomever invented this wonderful, compact machine.
I enjoy seeing the smiling faces of my family when I start baking and they can’t wait till I’m done.
I love to bake. I make bread, rolls, cinnamon rolls and yeasted coffee cakes all the time. I would love this because we keep our house on the cool side so I’m always waiting longer for my doughs to proof.
Baking makes me happy! My friends shake their heads and say, “but it is so much work!” and then eat my bread. It’s not work if you love it.
Its like dream come true when looking at this Brod and Taylor proofer….when reading thro’ this post at the beginning, I thought, hmmm….I can do my yoghurt in this…and viola…you can make yoghurt and how about melting chocolates? Well, we can do that too:):)
Baking yields happy faces.
Bread making touches all the senses and is good for the soul. The result, a magical gift for all.
For me, I enjoy the process of baking. That the end product is delicious is an added bonus!
have been a follower for a while and have been using your starter method will good results. My family and friends will not eat store bought bread now and are loving it. So I’m busy baking all the time and love it! Just want to say thanks for all the inspiration and great web blog!!
I love the smell of bread baking in the oven, and I love seeing something as simple as flour and water come together to be something delicious. Plus, homemade bread is 100 times better than store-bought loaves.
Nothing tastes better than a loaf of bread that you made from scratch with your own two hands.
I’ve been a lurker because my ambition exceeds my skill. I use my sourdough (from an old Alaskan starter) constantly and have hoped the blog will help me improve. I want home-made sourdough rye that’s perfect for my borscht, sourdough buns for home-grown grass-fed hamburger, sourdough rolls for dinner, sourdough buns for kielbasa, and… and… And every issue of Wild Yeast expands my list. I’ll die before I can finish, but that’s not all bad, is it?
I enjoy making bread and have had great success with the no-knead recipes. Now I’d like to expand my bread-making to sourdough bread recipes. “Wild Yeast” keeps me inspired!
I would love to win this item. I live in an older, rented house, and temperatures are not constant by any means! One of my favorite childhood memories is smelling my Aunt Betty’s yeast rolls rising, then baking. And they tasted so wonderful! I would love to be able to bake breads and rolls for my kids to experience some of those great memories second-hand. I have a bread machine, but it’s just not the same!
Thank you for all the wonderful recipes that I want to try. I hope to have some success close to yours!
I recently started baking with a sourdough starter (from the Friends of Carl), and don’t have a good set-up to proof my bread, especially now with the larger sourdough recipes. I’m also an avid yogurt maker, my method involves the heating pad/bath towel and is much less exact than a bread proofer.
I love your site. I’m working on a batch of Norwich Sourdough as I type this.
I love to bake because it relaxes me and let’s me take a break from studying 🙂
I am an early childhood teacher in a Waldorf school. My classroom would benefit greatly from this as we make bread once a week and I am striving to make sourdough bread part of our diet. I have my starter but have yet to make it happen.
Can’t imagine I’ll win the proofer, but thought this was as good a time as any to say how much I appreciate your blog. I try things I might not otherwise, thanks to you, even though I was a professional chef for 35 years. I love baking because it’s relaxing and my husband loves the results.
I love to bake bread because it life me up.
Baking gives me instant return and enjoy the fruit of my labor.
An excellent device. The perfect and useful companion for the amateur baking in any season.I usually use a large cooler and hot water (it holds more heat and humidity) .. the proofer looks like a dream come true for me now.
Baking? My husband said he married me for my looks and stuck around for the bread. (He has a sense of humor.)
I love baking because it is as much art as science. I preheat firebrick in my oven to hold the heat during the proofing.
I love baking – how bringing together a few ingredients together can creat such yummy treats. And the smell of fresh bread, cakes n cookies cant be beat. Baked goods are also my favorite gift to give – people truly appreciate the gesture of something you made just for them – whether its a birthday cake or homemade candy at christmas.
I love baking as a creative outlet… no two creations exactly the same, the joy of making something complex out of something simple and the pleasure when it turns out just right. Not only that, but baking makes people HAPPY whether they are receiving the goods or creating them. Happy is GOOD! 🙂
Baking is characterized by an almost magical alchemical process; one generates the most fantastic, delicious foods from a host of humble, modest ingredients. I am fasicinated by the methodology involved, which transform the everday ingredient, such as flour, into spectacular culinary fare, like a foccacia.
As a busy dad working 80 hrs a week, making bread with my kids is both fun and productive for all of us.
Susan the Baker, I have recently started making my own bread. Although I have been cooking since age seven, I always thought that baking required a lot of intricate tools and a mind full of formulas.
However, I have been amazed at the techniques and recipes that are available through blogs and interest groups. One of the exciting discoveries, however, is the sense of virtual community and sharing that exists as people come together for a common purpose — the wonder of BAKING!
In the past two weeks, I have made eight individual 12″ pizzas, cinnamon rolls using a sweet brioche, bagels (your recipe) and ciabatta. I am on my way to becoming a confident baker.
And most of all, since my 86 year old mother, my daughter, son-in-law and three grandsons (future bakers all) have recently moved in with my husband and I, it is fitting that our little home community join together to discover the value and satisfaction that comes from making food from scratch. P.S. Oh yes, by the I would love to have the Proofer!
I like to bake bread and other stuff because I know exactly what ingredients are in my baked goods.
Wow, where to start…I love baking for so many reasons. I love that it allows me to put forth something fresh, delicious and nutritious for my family. I love that it is something my sons want to share doing with me. I love that when it comes to bread, I can create something wonderful from such simple ingredients…like magic. I love the feeling of accomplishment that it gives me. I love that while I feel I have learned quite a bit, there is ever so much more out there to learn and master. Many thanks for your wonderfully inspiring and educating blog, and for a great giveaway like this!
My love of baking bread started last year when I became gluten free! I have enjoyed learning the process and baking has been a wonderful relaxing time for me. I would love to own a Proofer so that I may make the switch from “make shift” microwave proofer to awesome proofer!
Because I’m always learning something new, and it keeps me humble and on my toes…
As an avid home baker, I’ve been waiting for a viable, compact proofing solution for years. This looks great!! Thanks for the opportunity 🙂
The more often I bake my own bread, the more my interest in “technique” grows. Like you, I have fashioned many makeshift proofers…some work, and some haven’t. Either way, it all contributes to the learning process!
I would love to learn how to make bread without using my electric breadmaker.
I love baking bread and I have used many of the recipes from your blog. When a bake, I sometimes have trouble with keeping an accurate proofing temperature, and it can be a problem in the winter. This tool would definitely help. Thanks for offering the review.
As a young girl I dreamt about baking, but I was discouraged due to a slight mishap of baking a cake that boiled over into my mothers spotless oven. The art of bread making is still a tasty concept I want to perfect.
Baking bread is my favorite thing to do. I love the art & science, making something with my hands, and of course sharing and eating it!
Oh goodness! This sounds wonderful and would be of great help in my kitchen.
Thanks, Susan
I love baking because it fits my personality: I get to be creative and precise, impulsive and patient, methodical and experimental.
I love baking because it expands my personality: I get to be social and impressive.
there are two loves in my life. one is triathlon and the other is bread making. ive worked in all kinds of hotels and restaurants but my next with be artisan bread making. i love the process of bread and making sourdough is probably the most exciting thing for me….ever^_^.
I love to bake because you get a much better result than you can buy at the store.
I love baking bread, period! The smell…the taste…there is nothing in the world like a slice of warm bread, fresh from the oven…slathered with real butter…nothing!
I’d much rather bake than cook dinner! I started out baking cookies when I was in grade school. I don’t make cookies too much anymore, but I do love baking all kinds of breads. It’s so much fun to see the transformation of flour, water, & yeast to a finished bread.
Have just recently started baking with sourdough and have enjoyed it and your blog immensely!
I love baking vegan bread recipes and being able to pronounce all the ingredient names! Love baking with a sourdough starter….beautiful results!
I like to make and eat tasty things, and I am fascinated how a limited number of ingredients can be transformed into so many different things!
I bake breads for my family weekly as they enjoy simple 4-5 ingredient loaves that I put together. I can really use a good proofer.
Ray
The chemistry part of baking hooked me first, then the aspect of yeast really drew me in. I’m still loving it some 20 years later. I’d love a multi-function machine like that.
Baking bread is my creative outlet and each time I am amazed at the power of yeast, flour, water and salt!
I started baking artisan bread during a time we cared for my father as he suffered from dementia. The kitchen was strategically located so that I could keep an eye on him and indulge in this most pleasant of hobbies. Funny thing is when the bread came out of the oven, it would peak his interest and allow him to return to an almost normal state for a time. Oh how he loved it even though those early attempts were less than beautiful. Dad’s gone now, but the love of good bread here will last as long as my wife and I do. Thanks for the wonderful recipes you provide on your blog.
Baking is relaxing, nourishing and produces, quite often, art. I love it!
I grew up eating a lot of home made bread, and now am attempting all kinds of different breads on my own. I love the feel, smell, taste, and how it puts everyone in a good mood! And my kitchen is usually a cool place…