7 Grain Bread

With the holidays being over and January being a low spend month, I am trying to use up what we have in the pantry. While we do have a loaf of store bought bread in the house, it has way too much sodium in it for me, so I decided to make myself a 7 grain bread for toasting in the mornings. I looked for a recipe on Pinterest, in my King Arthur cookbook, and in my Farm Journal Bread book, but nothing sounded good except one but it seemed to long of a recipe for me. I know that sounds weird but hey, I like things to be simple. So I dug out my recipe for Low Sodium Bread and decided to use it and incorporate the grains in. I bought the grain mix at my local bulk food store to use for adding extra grains to our breads, muffins etc. If you cannot find this in your area, you can add different grains that you may have on hand, it doesn’t have to be the same as mine. It turned out well, but as with any homemade bread it does tend to dry out quickly. If anyone has an idea on how to keep it fresh longer just drop a comment below. Here is the list of ingredients.

1 cup warm water plus 1/4 cup warm milk 1/8 cup oil 2 Tblsp. sugar 1/4 tsp salt 2 1/4 tsp yeast 3 cups flour plus 1 cup 7 grain mix

Add the water, milk, sugar, and yeast, stir gently and let proof for 5 minutes. Add oil and salt, mix well. Add flour one cup at a time while also adding the grains until a dough ball forms. Knead for 5 minutes. I use my Kitchen Aid stand mixer for mixing and kneading, but you can do all of this by hand as well. Form into a loaf and let rise in a greased loaf pan until doubled in size. Bake for 30 minutes. Let sit for a minute before taking from pan to cool on a cooking rack.

I love how this turned out as it has a good crumb and texture which is great for toast or for a sandwich. I like using it for toast and putting some peanut butter on it which makes it a simple yet filling breakfast, especially when paired with fruit and a glass of milk. Again, homemade bread tends to dry out quick so if any of you know how to keep it fresh longer, please leave a comment below so we can all learn a new way to keep our home baked breads.

Your friend, Beth