Saturday, April 19, 2008

Whole Wheat Bread

Nothing beats fresh, homemade bread! I was lucky enough to enjoy such a treat every week growing up; mom always had fresh bread and homemade strawberry jam, and it is still one of my favorite snacks.

I love making bread now, though I'm not so sure I've got it perfected the way I want. It took me years to perfect my mother-in-laws dinner rolls, so maybe it will still take years for me to perfect my mother's wheat bread. I've only just started to make it since I now have my own flour mill and can grind my own wheat. Fresh wheat flour is so much better than store-bought and makes the bread all that much better.
Whole Wheat Bread
1/4 cup warm water
1 Tbsp. yeast
1/2 Tbsp. sugar
2 1/2 cups warm water
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup oil
1 tsp. salt
4 cups wheat flour
3-4 cups white flour

Mix 1/4 cup warm water, yeast, and sugar in a small bowl. Allow the yeast mixture to rise and double in size. In a large mixing bowl, mix 2 1/2 cups warm water, sugar, oil, and salt. Add yeast mixture once it has proofed. Add wheat flour and mix. Switch beaters to dough hooks on your mixer. Add enough white flour so that dough begins to form a ball, but not a stiff ball. Knead the dough by hand or with dough hooks for 10 minutes. (I just use my Bosch) Put dough in a greased bowl, cover, and allow to rise until double. (1 1/2 hours)

Punch down and let rest for 10 minutes. Grease three 8.5 x 4.5 x 2.5 loaf pans. Divide the dough into three balls. Roll each into a loaf and place in prepared pans, seam side down. Cover and let rise for 45 minutes or until loaf reaches the top of the pan. Bake at 350F for 35 minutes. Remove from pans, brush tops with melted butter, and let cool on a wire rack.

2 comments:

Kristine said...

That looks absolutely wonderful! Yummy! I should start into the whole bread making thing, but I've never really been good at it, so it's harder to try. Any tips at conquering something you've basically already given up on?

alanna said...

OK, so I tried this recipe. I'll start by saying that I've never attempted bread before and yeast still sort of scares me. That aside, I would have been pretty proud of myself if I had cooked the loaves long enough. I thought they were looking too done and so I pulled them out a little early. After they cooled I found that the inside of one loaf wasn't even near done, one was alright (if we toast it), and the last was near perfection.
I think we'll try again. It was a bit of work though considering I don't have a mixer (I'm working on getting one for my next birthday). And I didn't have any white flour...so I used all wheat flour (store bought...I'm not domestic enough for wheat grinding yet, I might look into it though).
Thanks for the recipe! I'm excited to get good at bread making. :)