Cake Bread

A clever bread machine hack that uses dry cake mix as a shortcut ingredient. Mixed with bread flour, yeast, butter, and water, it produces a soft, sweet loaf with a tender, cake-like crumb that’s somewhere between dessert and breakfast toast.

The cake mix brings sugar, leavening, and flavoring already blended in the right proportions, so you don’t need to measure out a bunch of extra ingredients. Whatever flavor cake mix you use shapes the final bread. Yellow cake mix gives you a classic sweet bread, chocolate makes something closer to a babka, and lemon or spice cake mix opens up all kinds of possibilities.

This is about as hands-off as baking gets. Dump everything in the bread machine in the order your machine specifies and walk away.

Pro Tips

• Follow your bread machine’s loading order. Some want liquids first, some want dry ingredients first. Getting this wrong can prevent the yeast from activating properly.
• Use the basic or white bread cycle. Sweet bread cycles work too, but basic is fine since the cake mix already provides enough sugar.
• Check the dough during the first knead. It should form a smooth ball. If it’s too dry, add water a teaspoon at a time. If too sticky, add flour a tablespoon at a time.

Variations

• Chocolate cake bread: Use chocolate cake mix for a rich, cocoa-flavored loaf. Try adding a handful of mini chocolate chips during the add-in beep.
• Cinnamon swirl: Use yellow cake mix and add a teaspoon of cinnamon to the dry ingredients for a sweet breakfast bread.