Tassajara Bread

Smile1968's Note:

This is a whole wheat bread that my mom has been making weekly for 25 years. This bread makes the most wonderful toast, and is super with a cup of Cocoa.

• Total Time: 4 hrs
• Prep Time: 3 hrs
• Cook Time: 1 hrs

Ingredients:

Servings: 10

• 6 cups lukewarm water
• 2 tablespoons yeast (2 pkgs)
• 1 cup honey or 1 cup brown sugar or 1 cup molasses
• 2 cups powdered milk
• 4 cups whole wheat flour
• 2 cups white flour
• 3 tablespoons salt
• 1 cup oil
• 6 -8 cups white flour

Directions:

1. Step one:.
2. Mix together Water and Yeast, let rest for 5 minutes. Then add Honey,(or Brown sugar or Molasses)Powdered Milk,Whole Wheat Flour and White Flour. Beat all these ingredients together well. This batter will be thick. Once well mixed, let rise 1 hour.
3. Step Two:.
4. Fold in Salt,Oil and Flour. Use more Flour as needed to Knead bread.
5. Let Bread rise for 50 minutes, then punch down. Let rise 40 more minutes then shape into loaves. This makes approximately 5 loaves. Put loaves into greased pans.
6. Let loaves rise for 20 minutes.
7. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.
8. When you remove the loaves from the oven, take a stick of Butter or Margarine and rub it over the top crust of the bread for a softer crust. Let cool in the pans for 5 minutes and remove to cooling racks.
9. Now when my mom makes this Bread, she makes half of the loaves with Cinnamon,Sugar,a little melted Butter and Raisins (my Husbands favorite) Make those loaves just like you would a Cinnamon Roll - flatten the dough out and spread the rest of the ingredients on the dough, then roll back up and put in pans.

Reviews

[HillSlug]

Wonderful bread. I own the book; it's a great resource. The best thing about this bread is that it encourages you to be flexible. I usually grind a few cups of wheat berries, but I often will grind up oats or soybeans to change the recipe a little. (The oat flour helps to keep the bread moist. The soybeans add protein.) Experiment with this recipe - you may come across a winner.

I highly recommend waiting for the bread to cool completely before slicing it.

The book contains a half-recipe that makes four loaves. I'd recommend using only 1 tablespoon of salt (the recipe calls for two, which makes a very salty bread).