Heavy Duty Whole Wheat Bread

Kathy brought a loaf of this bread (actually called Irv's Heavy Duty Whole Wheat Bread) one night when she and Nick came for dinner on Condor. We had another couple on board too and since it was a bit crowded in the cockpit, I stuck the bread under the dodger to keep for dinner. Then to my great embarrassment, I almost forgot to serve it; I remembered it just as I was about to serve dessert. Anyway as I later told Kathy when I asked for the recipe, though everyone had a small piece that night, Ed and I got most of the loaf to ourselves and enjoyed every last crumb. This bread is really good!

Kathy writes:

“Nick’s brother-in-law gave me this recipe many years ago. Amounts are approximate and my loaves are a little different each time.

1 c bran
4 c hi gluten whole wheat flour
2 c bulgur
2 c white flour
2 T yeast (proof with 1 tsp sugar and l c warm water)
1 T salt

About 3 cups liquid ( I usually use a cup or more of nonfat plain yogurt which I’m sure was in
your loaf. ) You can also use buttermilk as part of the liquid. The bread keeps much better with some milk product in it.

Make a sponge with 1 cup white flour, bran, proofed yeast, and bulgur (which should be softened first with one cup of hot water).
From here on you just add the flours and salt until it’s ready to knead.
Knead and let rise 1 to 2 hours. Punch down and divide in two and make into loaves. I use corn meal on the baking sheet to keep it from sticking. Let rise again usually less time than the first rising.

Preheat oven to 375- 400 F. Bake 45 min to 1 hour.

You can use some rye flour up to 1 cup without the dough getting too sticky. Other additions that I like are flax seed, wheat germ, wheat berries that are cooked or sprouted and ground. Irv bakes his bread on tiles. I usually slash the tops of the formed loaves before they rise to prevent bubbles in the finished loaf. I think your loaf had about 1 cup of softened bulgur. 2 cups of bulgur makes a very dense loaf. Irv rolls his dough into a rectangle and rolls it up to get rid of air bubbles. I don’t usually bother.

If you are used to making bread this is more info than you need, but if you have questions I’ll try and answer....

Happy baking!"

Reviewed 5/10/17