This week I finally made bread - 20 loaves. I have been procrastinating this for months. I usually like to make only 10 at a time - any more than that and it seems as if the whole process drags on too long. I decided to make the extra since I was going to give away a few loaves and our family seems to be devouring a lot of bread lately.
Here is the recipe I use. I don't have it perfected - it's a bit crumbly. It's definitely not sandwich bread worthy but it does make a delicious toast.
14 Grain Bread
Use your Bosch mixer if you have one. One batch of this dough yields 5 loaves.
6 cups warm water (approx. 115°F)
¨ø cup canola oil
¨ø cup honey
2 Tbsp salt
3 Tbsp dough enhancer
3 cups high gluten bread flour
3 Tbsp instant yeast
6-8 cups fresh ground flour (approx. 10-11 cups of un-ground flour is enough for this recipe)
2 cups nine grain cracked cereal
1 cup sunflower seeds
¨÷ cup millet
¨÷ cup flax seed
¨÷ cup sesame seed
¨÷ cup amaranth OR
1 pkg. 14 grain mix
Use the momentary switch to mix well. Turn the machine to speed 1 and continue to add wheat flour only until the dough begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl. When you can see the sides pull clean, as well as the dough coming clean from the bottom of the bowl, you know you have enough flour. Be careful not to add too much or it will cause it to be heavy and dry. The dough should be very sticky and does not come together at this point, but the bowl is clean.
Knead on Speed 1 for 8-10 minutes or until the gluten has been developed. If you feel your dough is too dry add a few tablespoons of water to moisten. If dough starts sticking, simply add a little white flour to take up the moisture.
Oil your hands, remove dough from mixer and place onto a slightly oiled counter. Divide your dough with a pastry scraper, if you have one, into 5 loaves (depends on your pan size).
Shape loaves and place in a well greased or sprayed pan. Never use oil. Cover with a dry towel and let rise until dough has doubled or is about 2 inches above the rim of the pan. Depending on the room temperature, this could take 30-60 minutes.
Bake in preheated oven at 350°F for 30-35 minutes or until the inside temp. is 200°. An instant read thermometer is very useful in telling whether your bread is done.
Cool on cooking racks before putting into bread bags. The bread can be frozen.
Yields: 5 loaves
Time to make: 1½ - 2 hours
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