Bread Machine Fruit Loaf

Description: This came from my bread machine recipe book. I have made it a number of times and it comes out lovely. Fantastic as a breakfast toasted and buttered! Yum! I have altered the recipe slightly so that it is compatible with all of you. An Australian tablespoon = 4 tsp (20ml), so I have converted all measurements to teaspoons to avoid confusion. If you have a sweet bread cycle I'd recommend using that, but otherwise I'm pretty sure ordinary would work fine. I have frozen slices in plastic bags, so I always have some on hand if I get a craving. Nutella makes a good spread for this.

Ingredients:

• 270 ml water
• 6 teaspoons butter or 6 teaspoons oil
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 6 teaspoons brown sugar
• 450 g white bread flour (3 cups)
• 6 teaspoons powdered milk
• 3 teaspoons ground mixed spice
• 2 teaspoons yeast
• 1/2 cup mixed dried fruit (I use sultanas and raisins, but you could use commercial mixed fruit or currants)
• 3 tablespoons water (optional)
• 6 teaspoons sugar (optional)
• 3 teaspoons gelatin (optional)

Steps:

1. Put all of the ingredients except the fruit in the order recommended by your manufacturer.
2. If you have a nuts dispenser place the fruit in there.
3. Otherwise add the fruit when the 2nd knead has 8 minutes to go.
4. If using the glaze, combine glaze ingredients in a small saucepan over a heat until the sugar and gelatine has dissolved.
5. Use the pause function if you have one, at fifteen minutes into the baking cycle, brush glaze over loaf.