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WINNER Panasonic SD-ZX2522KXC Breadmaker £239.99, argos.co.uk 89/100
Our winner has a whopping 37 settings, from sourdough to pizza and even jam! A dispenser holds back ingredients, such as fruit and nuts, adding them at the optimum point. It scored well across the board, impressing us with wholemeal and white loaves. It also has gluten-free functions. While it’s simple to use, with a clear interface, the only niggle is there’s no viewing window. RUNNER-UP Morphy Richards Homebake Breadmaker 502001 £99.99, Amazon 88/100 With its intuitive touchscreen display, this is a joy to use. It’s versatile, too, with 14 settings, and has a delay timer. Wholemeal loaves came out with an evenly browned, crisp crust and a springy interior. However, we found the larger white loaf outperformed the smaller, which had an uneven rise. Like our winning machine, this one can also make jam. BEST BUDGET BUY Cookworks Breadmaker £44.99, argos.co.uk 85/100 Although a fraction of the price of our winning machine, this budget breadmaker still has 12 different functions. We were impressed with the white and wholewheat loaves it produced, although it was a little unstable when mixing. As well as making jam, other settings include ‘quick’, which will produce a loaf in under two hours. It also comes with a useful recipe book.
HOW WE TESTED We bake a range of loaves to assess how the breadmaker copes with different ingredients. Every test is repeated for consistency. We also look at how user-friendly the design is.