I'm grinding my own Hard Red Wheat.
Should I be sifting it? and removing some of the bran / hulls?
I'm using a egg bread receipe.
3c flour
2T d.eggs or 3T depending on the flavor desired.
3T d.butter
4T sugar (white)
2t Yeast
1c water
1/4c Orange Juice
1t salt or less as desired
d.=dehydrated

This is a sure thing with AP flour.
Already tried adding more yeast and sugar, it helped a bit.

Thanks!

-- (perry@ofuzzy1.com), March 29, 2001

Answers

I have tried a million recipes to make a whole wheat bread that wasn't a brick. Mixing the red hard wheat and the white spring wheat, adding gluten, the only thing that makes the difference is using regular or bread flour. Lightens the mix significantly. Yep your recipe is healthy but if they won't eat it (except the chickens)........... waste of time. Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh TX (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), March 29, 2001.

Hi Perry , We have the same problem. I tried sifting but it did'nt do any good, everything came right through. We grind our hard red winter wheat, and Paul usually runs it 3 times through the mill to get it fine enough. (He wants to get another mill.) My machine recipe calls for 1 1/3 cup water--3 3/4 cups ww flour--1 1/2 tsp salt--1/3 cup brown sugar--3 Tbl dry milk--2 Tbl butter--1 3/4 tsp yeast. But my loaves still come out heavy. Lately I'll sub 1 cup bread flour for 1 cup of the ww flour, and it helps somewhat. Paul is so sweet he eats it no matter how bad it turns out !! He knows it is good for him. tee hee, Besides, after grinding all that wheat, he's not about to toss it! The main problem I'm having is keeping little hard pieces of , I don't know maybe the stone wheel out of the flour. I've sent him to the dentist twice now from him biting into something hard and cracking a tooth!! I told you he's a real sweet guy.. Teresa

-- teresa d. (t1noodles@aol.com), March 29, 2001.

Put a couple of teaspoons of GLUTEN in the recipe, it works, works, works, you can get it at the grocery store, but I find that it is cheaper at my health food store. Lynne

-- lynne (leaves8@hotmail.com), March 29, 2001.

I agree with the wheat gluten. I add it to all my yeast breads whether made in a bread machine or not.

-- bwilliams (bjconthefarm@yahoo.com), March 29, 2001.

I always add a quarter cup of oatmeal and a tablesoon of glutin and two extra tablespoons of water to the receipe. Works every time, Daryll

-- Daryll (twincrk@hotmail.com), March 29, 2001.

Gluten, egg whites and sprouted wheat berries all help. We also bake the bread in the wood cookstove whenever we can, so we let it rise longer and warmer than the breadmaker would.

-- David C (fleece@eritter.net), March 29, 2001.

Hi, Perry. Does your bread machine have an adjustment for the rising time? Because using fresh "alive" flour does not require as long of a rising time than "dead" AP flour. It sounds like to me, that your bread is overrising in the machine. Therefore, it comes out like a brick.

When I make our bread, (not in a machine) it only takes 15 minutes to double in size. (using freshly ground whole wheat). It's been my experience that the machines can't adjust to fresh flour. Try the same recipe the old fashioned way, in the oven, and see if it tastes better. (adding gluten always helps lighten the dough).

If you can only knead with your machine, that helps in cutting down prep time. Then just shape the loaves, and let em rise.

Hope this helps.

-- Patti (pioneerpatti@msn.com), March 29, 2001.

My wheat bread always could be used as a deadly weapon until I started adding gluten to the dough. I buy Hodgson Mill vital wheat gluten with vitamin C...comes in a 6 and 1/2 oz box..You add one TBSP per each loaf...after finding that, all of my whole wheat loaves come out 100% terrific...this sounds like a TV commercial, LOL..but it really does make quite a difference! God bless.

-- Lesley (martchas@bellsouth.net), March 29, 2001.

If you like to collect cookbooks, look into getting Shirley O. Corriher's book, Cookwise. Her book helped me tremendously in my effort to make a good loaf of bread. It tells you what to do and why it works, the science behind cooking. She also has chapters on using eggs, working with sugar, etc.

-- (dshogren@uswest.net), March 30, 2001.

My last BRICK BREAD was tossed into the hammer mill..The hens loved it. I couldn't bust it up with a hammer. James

-- James (jamesj1592@about.com), March 30, 2001.

I've never been able to get a whole wheat recipe to turn out. I finally settled on a mixture of 1/2 whole wheat (I like the white wheat better but haven't been able to find it lately) and 1/2 bread flour (not AP). I have also used gluten and it does help but isn't needed with the 1/1 ratio. I add a touch more water since the wheat flour seems to soak up more. I just found an organic wheat flour (at Meijer's of all places!) that wasn't too astronomical in price but haven't tried it yet.

Hoosiermom

-- Hoosiermom (hdnpines@hotmail.com), March 31, 2001.

Duh! I was just making the first loaf of bread this year without the wood stove going and remembered what made the biggest difference for us. ALWAYS USE WARM WATER. We had gone for weeks trying to figure out why our kids could not make a good light loaf following the exact same recipe that we did. The difference was that I had simply forgotten to tell them to use warm water! It may not turn a brick into wonderloaf, but it makes a huge difference. If the kitchen is really cold, I even put hot water in the breadmaker pan as the first ingredient, which warms it up before I add the yeast, etc. Scientifically, this makes sense since the rule of thumb is that a 10 degree celcius temperature rise doubles growth rates of simple organisms like yeast. The optimum growth temperature for yeast is about 37-40 celcius, just above body temperature. Hope this helps, sorry for the brain lapse!

-- David C (fleece@eritter.net), April 04, 2001.

Put in extra water and let it rise longer. this worked for us.

-- paul k. (ptkonstant@aol.com), April 04, 2001.

You might try using hard white wheat, aka Montana 86 wheat. I find it makes a lighter loaf.

-- R. (thor610@yahoo.com), April 05, 2001.

Adding Vitamin C crystals to your bread machine recipe works wonders. Only about 1/8 teaspoon is required.

-- Robin Masters (Robin@AOL.com), May 15, 2001.