Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Guest Baker . . . Anne!


This is the bread recipe that my mom used when I was growing up. It was always such a treat when I'd come home from school to loaves of freshly baked bread. I know that sounds cliche, but whatever--it's something my mom was really good at and I loved it.

So when Anne began her mission to domestify, I suggested she get the recipe from my mom. As it turns out, it is a very quick and simple recipe--especially for whole wheat. It makes five loaves, so one bread-making session will be enough to last for a while.

100% Whole Wheat bread (large batch)
5 cups warm water (120-130 degrees)
2/3 cups oil
2/3 cups honey
3 T yeast
3 T dough enhancer
(you can probably find it at your grocery store in the baking section)
2 T salt
10 -12 cups whole wheat flour


Preheat oven to 150 degrees

Put warm water, oil, and honey in mixer bowl.
Add yeast, dough enhancer, salt
Mix briefly
Add 8 cups of the flour and mix
With mixer running, quickly add remaining flour 1 cup at a time until dough forms a ball and cleans the side of the bowl
(this is the only part that takes finesse--too much flour will make dough heavy, unable to raise; too little and the dough will be sticky, so wait a few seconds in between cups, to see the flour get incorporated and watch for the sides to come clean. Bowl should be clean all the way down, slightly under the dough ball--but stop adding flour right when that happens)
Knead in mixer for 7-10 minutes

Lightly oil hands, shape dough into 5 loaves and place in oiled pans
TURN OFF OVEN
Place bread in warm oven with room between pans.
Let rise until double (20-30 minutes)
Leave bread in oven and turn heat to 350
Bake 30-35 minutes

The special tricks of this recipe are:
--letting the dough rise in a warm oven--it cuts the time by literally hours
--the dough enhancer--it gives the bread a white bread texture and lightness

You can also take one or two loaves-worth of the dough (okay, or the whole dang batch) and roll it out to make amazing cinnamon or orange rolls (use any recipe for the filling and bake times)
Nice job Anne! You're so domestic!
(For full disclosure, it should be noted that Anne also inherited a bread recipe from her side of the family that's great, but it's more like an after dinner kind of bread. It's also quite simple--maybe we'll get that one on here sometime too.)


*Editor's note--I think this recipe's fine for cinnamon rolls and such if you really want to use whole wheat. However, if we're gonna make cinnamon rolls, then let's make CINNAMON ROLLS. I hope to feature Danielle's cinnamon rolls in the near future (You better unpack your baking box Danielle). They're like Cinnabon, without the shame of walking through the airport carrying a watermelon-sized pastry in your sticky hands.

6 comments:

Danielle said...

Oh yipee. I have been thinking about making wheat bread lately...something that I have NEVER done. Can you believe it? Because they were talking about food storage at church, so naturally I was thinking about what I would eat if I ever had to actually use food storage, which naturally made me think of wheat bread. So basically you are both inspired...which is no surprise. And to further compound the freakiness of the mind-connection we have going on, I unpacked my (several) baking boxes just this night, and Anne you were the only one to get the Snow reference, and I could not love you more. Cinnamon rolls on! Name the day. Do you know I now live a short 20 minutes away.

wes said...

*sentimental sigh*
This is almost the same recipe that my mom used for bread all of MY growing up life! LOVE IT!

WAY TO GO, Anne!!

wes said...

dah - that was lori above...(I don't think Wes would want the "sentimental sigh" to go unclarified =)

Joan said...

You are so clever, Tay. Your posts come right out and give me a "Tay Hug" and I love it!
For some reason yeast scares me...so it may be awhile before I try this one out.

Rachel said...

I am totally going to make this bread, I'm so happy to have this recipe now. You are so nice to me. Also, I laughed out loud at the editor's note...so where are that cinnamon roll recipe?? Stephen and Sam would love me forever! I almost made some the other day...and I was like...no, I want a kick butt recipe, where is a kick butt recipe?? Hook a sistah up!!

Heather said...

First time I EVER made succesful wheat bread. Thank you