Bread Baking Adventure

Today I decided to return to an old tradition. For several years I baked all the bread our family ate. So there were no trips to the store for their sad excuse for bread. I love homemade bread, but haven't felt that I have the time to make it myself, until today. So Karter and I set out to make bread which was an interesting task with Karter in tow. All was going well till Karter managed to fling vital wheat gluten all over the counter with a majority of it ending up in the fruit bowl. Then there was the honey incident. To a 3 year old it seems logical that more honey will only make it taste better so he added a little extra and decided to shake the measuring cup rapidly to get the honey to come out which left little sticky lines all over my counter tops. All in all, it was a huge success. We have 4 lovely loaves of bread and had our own little lunch treat of fresh whole wheat bread with butter and honey.

The recipe we used is pretty easy and I got it from my sister-in-law who is a bread making goddess. She's an amazing baker! Thanks so much Becki for the recipe! So I'll share with you. If you're adventurous enough to try out the recipe just remember to unplug the wheat grinder when you go to open in up, especially if you have a little button happy child in the kitchen with you. It's amazing how little it takes to make a full blown flour cloud. Happy baking!

Whole Wheat Bread

7 cups warm water
3 TBS. lecithin (liquid)
2 TBS. yeast
1/3 cup honey
2 TBS. dough enhancer
2 TBS. salt
1/4 cup vital wheat gluten flour
16 - 18 cups flour

Measure all the ingredients except the flour into mixing bowl. Put in 7 cups flour and mix on medium speed until all is mixed. Add remaining flour until the mixture cleans the side of the bowl and dough doesn't stick to your fingers. Set mixer to knead. Most mixers take 5-8 minutes to develop the gluten. Put into five eight inch greased loaf pans. Let rise until double in size. Bake at 350 for 35 minutes.