Honey Oatmeal Bread

This bread has so far been my favorite homemade bread.  It has a great honey flavor and is moist.

I have been loving my wheat grinder and grinding extra flour to keep in my refrigerator to use in my pancakes, waffles, and any breads that I make!  I have even put a little in my cookies, cinnamon rolls, and pizza dough the other night!

A great recipe to use whole wheat in and one my whole family loves!

Honey Oatmeal Bread

(http://www.tastykitchen.com/)

• 4 1/2 tsp yeast
• 1/2 cup honey
• 4 tbsp butter
• 2 1/4 cups water
• 1 tbsp salt
• 2 3/4 cups flour
• 4 cups whole wheat flour
• 1 cup oats
• 1 egg

In a medium saucepan, melt your butter and honey together.  Remove from heat when butter melted and add your water.  Make sure mixture is not too hot so you don't kill the yeast and then stir in your yeast.  Let this mixture sit for about 10 minutes or until your yeast is all bubbly.

In your mixer, using the dough hook, combine salt, yeast mixture, 2 cups whole wheat flour and 1 cup white flour.  Beat for about 2 minutes, scraping the sides of the bowl as needed.  Gradually beat in your egg and 1 more cup whole wheat flour and 1 cup white flour to make a thick batter.  Keep beating for about 2 minutes. 

Stir in your oats now and 1 more cup of wheat and 1 cup of white flour.  Knead with your mixer until the dough is smooth and elastic.  If you find it is really sticky, you might need to add more flour.  I have ended up adding almost 1 cup more of flour when making this bread.  Add your flour slowly so not to add too much.

Place your dough in a greased bowl and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about 1 hour!  I always cover my dough with a clean kitchen towel.  I absolutely love my oven because it has a proofing cycle and it helps raise my bread so well!!

After it has doubled in size, punch your dough down and turn onto a floured surface.  Cover your dough with your bowl and let sit for about 15 minutes.

Shape into 2 loaves and place in your greased bread loaf pans.  Cover again and let rise for about 1 hour. 

Bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes or until the tops of your bread is golden brown.  Try not to eat it all warm, but soo yummy when it is warm with jam and butter, or forget the butter and just jam or even plain!!

Multigrain Bread

I have made a resolution this year to try and make homemade bread more often.  I am trying to make it once a week~so far I have done that!

I am also using more wheat in my breads, going for the healthier resolution too!  I have found a couple breads that have been really really good!  They have been moist, easy and really delicious!

I found this recipe on ourbestbites, but originally found in the Cook's Illustrated Cookbook.  Try it out and you won't be disappointed!

Multigrain Bread

(found on www.ourbestbites.com)

• 1 1/4 cup seven-grain hot cereal mix (I used a 6-grain mix from Alison's pantry that worked out great, but I am going to look for the 7-grain to try next time)
• 2 1/2 cups boiling water
• 3 cups all-purpose (not bread) flour
• 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/4 cup honey
• 4 tbsp butter, melted and cooled
• 2 1/2 tsp yeast
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1/2 cup oats (for topping)

Place 7-grain mix (or 6-grain) in your mixer and pour the boiling water on top.  Let this mixture stand for about 1 hour.  Stir occasionally.  The mixture should resemble thick porridge.  The 6-grain mix wasn't porridge, but really moist.

Now add honey, butter, and yeast and mix on low speed until combined.  Add both flours about 1/2 cup at a time.  Knead bread with your mixer until a cohesive mass starts to form, 1 1/2-2 minutes.  Cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap and let dough rest for 20 minutes.

Add salt now and then mix in your mixer until dough clears side of bowl, about 3-4 minutes.  (I didn't read this and ended up adding the salt with the flours and didn't do this step).  Once bread dough clears sides of bowl, knead for 5 more minutes.

Place dough in a greased bowl and cover tightly with plastic wrap and let rise at room temp until doubled in size ~ 45-60 minutes. 

Grease two bread pans.  Put your dough on a floured surface and divide into 2 balls.  Shape your dough into loaf shape, repeat with second ball also.  Spray loaves lightly with water or vegetable oil spray.  Roll each loaf in the oats to coat evenly and then place into your loaf pans.  Cover loosely with greased plastic wrap and let rise until doubled in size (about 30-40 minutes).

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Bake for 35-40 minutes or until golden brown.  Place pans on wire rack and let rest for 5 minutes and then remove loaves from pans and let cool!

Fabulous Brown Bread, Multi-Grain Bread and French Bread

We had a great activity last night and learned all about bread from Wendy! Here are a few recipes we tried that were fabulous!!!

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Fabulous Brown Bread

• 1 tbsp yeast
• 3 cup hot water (really really warm)
• 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil (or any type of oil)
• 1/4 cup molasses
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/2 cup wheat gluten
• 3/4 cup non-fat dried milk
• 1 tbsp salt
• 4 cups wheat flour
• 3-4 cups white flour

Mix all ingredients together in a mixer. Add just enough white flour to create dough (add your wheat first and then add the white by the cup full to see how much you need), but dough will remain sticky! Let rise until doubles.

Punch down dough and put into loaf pans (makes 2-3 loaves). Let rise one hour. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes.

Multi-Grain Bread

• 1 tbsp yeast
• 3 cups hot water (not too hot!)
• 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil (or any type oil)
• 1/4 cup molasses
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/2 cup wheat gluten
• 1 cup 9 grain mix
• 3/4 cup non-fat dried milk
• 1 tbsp salt
• 4 cups wheat flour
• 3-4 cups white flour

Mix all ingredients together in mixer. Add just enough flour to create dough, but dough will remain sticky. Let rise until doubles.

Punch down dough and put in loaf pans. Let rise one hour. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes

Kitchen Aid Mixer French Bread

• 2 tbsp yeast
• 3 cup hot water (not too hot)
• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil (or any oil)
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 tbsp salt
• 7 1/2 cups white flour

Mix all ingredients together in mixer on high. Let rest 10 minutes. Turn on high for 10 seconds. Repeat rest and punch down a total of 5 times (50 minutes).

Divide the dough in half and roll out into a long loaf. Put on a well greased cookie sheet sprinkled with corn meal. Slash top of bread(just use a knife and cut into the bread a little) several times and let rise 20 minutes.

Beat up 1 egg white and 1 tsp water. Brush over loaves and sprinkle with sesame seeds if desired. Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes! Enjoy!!

Blender Wheat Pancakes

I found this on http://www.everydayfoodstorage.net/ and they really turned out great! I didn't even tell my kids they were wheat, they ate them up! She has a berry syrup recipe with this that I haven't tried yet, but it sounded really good!

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Blender Wheat Pancakes

1 cup milk (3 tbsp powdered milk and 1 cup water)

1 cup wheat kernels, whole & uncooked

2 eggs (2tbsp powdered eggs, 1/4 cup water)

2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp salt

2 tbsp oil

2 tbsp honey or sugar

Put milk and wheat kernels in blender. Blend on highest speed for 4-5 minutes or until batter is smooth. (I probably blended for 6 minutes or so, just to guarantee it was smooth) Add eggs, oil, baking powder, salt, and honey or sugar to above batter. Blend on low. Pour out batter into pancakes from the blender, only one bowl to mess!!

Cook and enjoy!

Berry Syrup

2 cup mixed berries (raspberries, blueberries, marionberries or whatever mixture you want)

3 tbsp sugar

Mix together and let stand for 10-15 minutes before serving!

Hot Pockets

I found this recipe on http://www.everydayfoodstorage.net/! I love her site, because she shows you how to use your food storage in all your meals! She makes it look so simple, and this one definitely was simple! Pick whatever you want inside, and you have an instant hot pocket! We made pizza pockets and the kids loved them! This recipe may make only 6, but they were bigger than say the store bought ones! It was a quick easy meal, and you could definitely make more if you made them smaller!

Hot Pocket Dough- makes six 6 inch pockets

from Everydayfoodstorage

1 C. Luke Warm Water2 T. Olive Oil or Canola Oil
1 t. Sugar
1/2 t. Salt
3 C. Flour (I usually do Half all-purpose and half whole wheat or all whole wheat flour)
1 1/2 t. Yeast

Dough by hand:Dissolve Yeast in warm water. Add Oil, Sugar, and salt. Slowly mix in flour and knead. Cover and let rise for 45 minutes.
Dough in Bread Machine: (this is my favorite because you can throw all the ingredients in and set the dough cycle and get some other things done while it’s doing the work for you!)
Add ingredients in order your bread machine specifys (for example: for mine I need to add the liquid first, then dry ingredients, and then form a well and pour my yeast in). You don’t want your dough to raise for more than one hour. Most bread machine dough cycles will “beat” down the dough and you’ll want to take the dough out before it does that. Consult your users manual for timing and instructions on how to put the ingredients in.

1. Pre-heat oven to 375
2. When dough is ready, separate it in to 6 portions. If you want to be really exact, you can weigh the dough. I usually just eye ball it.
3. Using a rolling pin, roll out dough to 1/8 inch thick circles.
4. Let dough rest for 5 minutes.
5. Put 1/4-1/2 cup worth of filling. If you’re making all the same kind of hot pockets mix all your filling items together and use a scoop to fill the pockets. (pizza pockets, ham and cheese, chicken and other various pizza and hot sandwich fillings)
6. Fold dough in half over the filling and clamp edges with fork.
7. You can brush the tops with an egg white wash (1 egg white beaten with 1-2 T. water) if you want them to look really professional! (I usually don’t because I think they look delicious with out the hassle. Besides I can’t ever figure out anything to use that one egg yolk in and I hate to waste it!)
8. Bake for 15-20 minutes at 375.

Wheat Bread

This wheat bread is from Karma and is like corn bread!

3 cups whole wheat flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

2 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 cups milk

1/2 cups honey melted

1/3 cup oil

Mix liquid ingredients. Add to sifted dry ingredients, Mix.

Bake in 9x13 pan @350 for about 25 minutes!