Ingredients
Scale
- 2 3/4 cups very warm water
- 1/3 cup olive oil [or whatever oil makes you happy]
- 1/3 cup honey
- 2 tablespoons molasses
- 1 tablespoon salt [I used sea salt]
- 2 tablespoons dry active yeast
- 6–7 c. whole wheat flour
- 1/2 c. milled flaxseed
Instructions
- Place the oil, honey, and molasses in the bowl of your mixer. Admire how pretty it looks.
- Add the salt, water and the yeast. Let it sit for a few minutes, until puffy and bubbly.
- Add two cups of the flour and the milled flaxseed and mix until well combined.
- With your mixer turned on to the lowest setting, gradually add more flour until the dough starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl. Don’t add too much – you want it to be fairly sticky [see Step 3 in the pictures]. I usually add around 6 1/2 cups total [including the 2 cups added above]. The trick is to have your dough stand up with the least amount of flour so the bread will be fluffy. Don’t overmix it.
- When your dough is holding together, leave it in the mixer, cover the bowl and let it rise for 30-60 minutes depending on the warmth of your kitchen. It doesn’t have to double, but you want it puffy.
- Spray two bread pans with non-stick spray. [My pans are 9×5.]
- Mix the dough again just enough to knock it down close to the original size. Just a few seconds on the lowest setting is all you need.
- Drop the dough on a floured surface. Divide the dough in half and form each one into a loaf shape. Do not roll the dough out with a rolling pin – use your hands to make a ball and then turn the dough under itself over and over until you have a nice loaf shape – smooth top, smooth sides.
- Place the loaves in your bread pans and let them rise until almost doubled. [Remember, do not fall asleep at this point.]
- Bake in a preheated oven at 350 for about 35 minutes, until the tops are golden and if you tap the bottom of the loaves, they sound hollow.
- Remove from the pans and cool the loaves on a rack. In theory, you shouldn’t cut the bread until they are fully cooled because they still do a little cooking while cooling and if you cut it while cooling, it releases the heat. Yeah, right – go ahead and cut into that baby, slap some butter on and enjoy it hot.
Notes
Note on flour: I usually make this with King Arthur whole wheat flour. I recently bought the Whole Foods 365 brand of whole wheat flour to save money and used that instead. It was still good, but I really could tell a difference in taste. I think it’s much better with the King.
- Don’t place your loaves in a bag until completely cooled. They’ll get sweaty. Ick.
- Do not store the bread in the fridge – it will get hard and the texture will suck. It will keep for about a week at room temperature just fine before it starts to get stale.
- If you want to store the second loaf, once completely cooled, wrap it in saran wrap and then wrap foil over that and freeze.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Slice
- Calories: 180
- Sugar: 5g
- Sodium: 237mg
- Fat: 2.4g
- Saturated Fat: .5g
- Fiber: 5g
- Protein: 5.4g
- Cholesterol: 0