What started out as a simple day of making one loaf of bread turned into 3 loaves of bread. The recipe I am featuring today is a very, and I mean very simple whole wheat bread dough. It’s so easy peezy, that you can start playing with switch outs quite easily.
One ingredient will call for some clarification, that is ‘wheat gluten’. What I usually do is add around 3 tablespoons for every loaf of whole wheat bread that I make. If it’s not my recipe I remove 3 tablespoons of whole wheat flour and replace it with the gluten. This helps to render a very light whole wheat bread.
You can purchase the gluten many places. If you live near an Amish store or Mennonite store, this is a good route to choose. My last big bag was around $9.
My son’s gal, Paige and I also re-started sour dough starters this weekend. Hopefully by mid-April we will be making this healthy bread once again. There’s nothing like a sour dough that is fed with potato flakes versus flour. The flavor is just magnified to a whole new level.
In the event you are a regular reader, and you are wondering what I finally served for Easter dinner, well; here goes: Turkey, ham, potato casserole, scalloped pineapple, roasted vegetables, in the oven, Cole slaw, deviled eggs, homemade bread, a fluffy salad, and lemon cake with toppings for dessert. Our dear friends came over following church and we enjoyed a good time of fellowship together.
The week looks like a good one in the weather department. No big rain events and some decent ‘spring’ temps. I have sewing and organization on my home list. The week starts out with ‘donkey basketball’, which is something I haven’t enjoyed for years, it should be fun. I haven’t begun to think about outside flowers yet, it will come in time. Right now, I just want to re-find our bedroom, and pack away some of the heaviest sweaters for the season. Right now, the week looks fairly calm on my Day-Timer, hopefully it will stay that way. Simply yours, The Covered
Dish.
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Sorghum Whole Wheat Bread
5 teaspoons active dry yeast. (This was about 2 1/2 packets.)
2 cups warm water, (105-115)
1/2 cup sorghum
2 large eggs, beaten
3 cups whole wheat flour
3 cups all purpose flour or bread flour
6 tablespoons of gluten
2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
Activate yeast in warm water. If it bothers you not use a teaspoon of sugar to make the activation happen faster, go ahead and add it. Let this set for 5-10 minutes, while you prepare the whisked eggs and the sorghum
Put all the dry ingredients together. *Tip, if you are using the kitchen aid for blending and kneading why not put all the dry ingredients in the mixer bowl and using the whisk head bring all the dry together? Then remove from the bowl.
Combine the yeast mix and the eggs and sorghum together. Using the regular mixer head add half of the dry mix to the bowl. Blend; switch to the dough hook and add the remaining dry ingredients. If the dough would happen to be too dry or too wet add your additions 1 tablespoon at a time. Dough will begin to work up the dough hook when it is ready to remove from the bowl.
Rub a glass or metal bowl with oil or butter, make the dough into a ball place in the bowl and put a bit of oil on top. Cover with a tea towel and allow to rise. You can make a proofing oven by turning an oven to 180 or 200, and then turning it off. Some folks even like a pan of boiling water in the oven while the bread rises.
When the bread has doubled in size knock it down, and work it into 3 oval loaves. Place in greased baking pans. Slide back in a proofing oven or allow to double on the counter. Bake bread at 350 degrees until it’s about 190 degrees, it will continue to increase in temp. once it comes from the oven. Start checking bread at about 20 minutes. Grease tops with butter after removing from the oven.
At home I increase the salt amount to 3 teaspoons. Remember it’s the first rise that flavor develops, not the second.
*IF I remember correctly, when I wrote this recipe I was shooting for low sugar content. Also; you could use milk instead of water in this recipe, milk is a good tenderizer.
