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I have heard that high altitude can create bad results when making bread in a bread machine. I live at 7,000 ft above sea level. If I bought a bread machine, is there some way to compensate for the altitude, so that the results are still good?

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  • I suppose that the machine is electric so no matter how to get the required T. A change might be that the dough rises faster than at sea level as gas evolution it is easy at the reduced atmospheric pressure. On the other hand and for the same reason, yeast should breath with more difficulty. Not sure what effect is the predominant one. – Alchimista Feb 07 '19 at 10:46

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This site claims that you should add some extra flour and liquids while reducing yeast and sugar, while increasing temperature and reducing time. I'm not sure that I accept their reasoning behind increasing the amount of liquids (supposedly to counteract dryer air), but at the same time increasing the amount of flour.

You probably can't adjust either time or temperature in your bread maker, though.

A lot of their reasoning is based on the air being dryer at altitude, but I would have thought that the breadmaker would be sealed enough to maintain a humid enough atmosphere inside.

That is based on 3500ft above sea-level , but you're twice as high. At your altitude water boils at 92°C, which means that the bread will expand faster in the oven, but before setting properly.

If you can't change any other parameters, I would try to reduce the amount of dough in each batch, to ensure that it heats through faster

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A book called ''Bread baking for beginners'' says that you should reduce the yeast by one quarter, whilst slightly increasing the amount of water. Also, reducing the water temperature to slow the rise could also help. Lastly, it mentions lowering the oven temperature slightly to prevent over-baking. I hope this helps!

Theodora Demetriou
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