Robin, I think your suggestion of adding the M&M's to the dough
manually is the best way to keep them intact. Depending on your
machine, you may want to set a timer and add them at the beginning of
the final rise. Some machines do a rather vigorous "punch down" in
between rising cycles which would crush some of them. Also, a word
of caution.....if you remove the dough from the pan, make sure the
pan doesn't dislodge from the base. In some bread machines, if the
pan is removed or dislodged, the machine shuts off. In that case,
you'd have to raise the bread one last time and bake it in the oven.
Yes, the mixing blade can be removed from the pan at that time, too
(at the beginning of the final rise). It does have a function up
until then to "punch down" the dough in between rising cycles. But
it is not needed from the final rise on.
Linda Rehberg
co-author of the Bread Machine Magic series of books