Whole Wheat Bread Recipe

In my mind there's nothing quite as wonderful as fresh homemade bread. Even just the thought of it makes my mouth water. To me the smell of homemade bread wafting through the house is one of contentment and love. With six kids growing up, my Mom baked bread almost every day. I remember most days coming home from school and having a big, thick slice of it spread with butter. Of course I didn't appreciate it then as much as I do now. I remember my friends ranting and raving about how good the bread was when they'd come over. I remember thinking, "What? What's the big deal? Don't all Moms do this?" Now I realize, that no, not all Moms did it then and even fewer do it now. I love my Mom for what she created with her homemade bread. Not only healthy food for her family, but a delicious memory as well.

Here's my homemade bread recipe. It is a whole-wheat bread recipe with no white flour.  

Whole Wheat Bread
Printable Recipe

INGREDIENTS:

3 Cups hot water, microwave on high 2-3 min or until quite warm ( >110° F)

1/3 Cup oil
1/3 Cup sugar
1 Tbsp. salt (put in first before adding yeast)

½ Cup gluten flour*

½ Cup ground flax seed, optional (adds a great texture)

½ Cup rolled or quick oats, optional
3+ Cups freshly ground whole wheat flour (ground from hard white wheat)
2 Tbsp yeast on top of flour

DIRECTIONS:

Combine above ingredients in Bosch mixer with dough hook and mix. Add more whole wheat flour until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl. Then mix for an additional six minutes. Divide dough into 3 loaves (the dough will still be VERY sticky - so sticky that you won't be able to form your loaves without putting oil on your hands). Put dough in oiled pans. Let rise until double or until the bread fills the pans. While bread is rising, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. When the bread has risen, bake it at 400 deg. for 5 minutes. Then turn down the heat to 350 degrees and continue baking for 25 min or until done.

*NOTE on the Gluten flour: I use Bob's Red Mill Vital Wheat Gluten Flour that I buy at WinCo foods in their bulk bins - or you can get a 25 lb. bag of it there if you order it. I think you can also get it at Walmart in smaller quantities - like 22 oz. pkgs. You only use 1/2 cup for 3 loaves so it lasts a long time. It allows you to make the bread with whole-grain flour and still have it light and fluffy and stick together. This really is not an optional ingredient - you can try to leave it out, but you will end up with denser bread, that is crumbly, doesn't have as long of a shelf life and really is not as enjoyable to eat. Another option (if you're looking for one) is to use a good quality, high gluten white flour instead of some of the whole-wheat flour (experiment with how much - maybe 2 cups or more to get it to a good stick-together consistency). I'd rather spend a little more for the gluten flour because you can use less of it (which means more whole-grain flour which is better for you) and still have a great textured, tasty bread.

Recipe Source: healthyfamilycookin.blogspot.com