Whole Grain Master Bread Recipe

from "Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day"

• Ready In: 4 hrs 10 mins
• Serves: 12

Ingredients

• 5 1⁄2 cups whole wheat flour
• 2  cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 1⁄2 tablespoons  granulated yeast
• 1  tablespoon kosher salt
• 4  tablespoons vital wheat gluten
• 4  cups  lukewarm water (about 100 degrees F)

Directions

1. Measure the dry ingredients into a 5-quart bucket or bowl, and whisk them together (you can also use a fork, or if it’s lidded, just shake them well).
2. Add the water to form a very wet dough.
3. Cover loosely (leave lid open a crack) and allow to rise for two hours at room temperature (if you decreased the yeast, you’ll need more time). NEVER PUNCH DOWN or intentionally deflate. The dough will rise and then begin to collapse. Refrigerate and use over the next 14 days, tearing off one-pound loaves as you need them.
4. On baking day, cut off a grapefruit-sized piece of dough (about a pound), using a serrated knife or a kitchen shears.
5. Quickly shape the loaf by pulling the top around to the bottom and rotating, but don't knead.
6. Cover the loaf loosely with plastic wrap and let it rest on a pizza peel covered with cornmeal or parchment for 90 minutes (or 40 if your dough is fresh and not refrigerate).
7. Thirty minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C), with a baking stone placed on a middle rack. Place an empty broiler tray for holding water on any other rack that won’t interfere with rising bread.
8. Just before baking, use a pastry brush to paint the top with water and sprinkle with a seed mixture if desired. Slash the loaf with 1/4-inch deep parallel cuts across the top (or a singe lengthwise cut as in the first picture). Use a serrated bread knife held perpendicularly to the loaf.
9. Slide the dough onto the pizza stone. Pour 1 cup hot tap water into the broiler tray. Bake for about 30 minutes or until done.