Friday, December 08, 2006

Loaf #12, half whole wheat


This time around I made the loaf with half whole wheat and half high gluten flour. Again I followed the basic bread recipe, the preferment was 8 oz of high gluten flour, and for the rest I used 12 oz whole wheat and 4 oz high gluten. I didn't bother with a glaze on this one, but I did try a simple knot that didn't work out quite like I intended. It looks good and tasted great, but was a bit lopsided. The high gluten flour gave the loaf a wonderful lift so it wasn't the paving stones that the whole wheat loaf turned out to be. I have heard that additional gluten can make even a whole wheat loaf into a soft bread, but that's an experiment for another time.

After proofing and shaping I put the dough into a 1.5 qt round Pyrex dish, then baked it for the usual 35 minutes. The taste was the usual good basic bread taste except with the more earthy flavor from the whole wheat.
The cross section shows an excellent crumb (texture) throughout the entire loaf. I love eating huge slabs of bread with a little olive oil spread and jelly. I do plan to do more with this recipe later, mostly adding other types of flour along with the wheat as about half of the dry goods content. When I'm out of flour I'll be adding gluten to see how that works with the dough.