Boredom and Bread

Husband sleeping, baby sleeping, book finished, nothing on T.V., computer boring, not tired enough to also sleep....what now? Bake bread! This was my thought process this afternoon. I ate this homemade bread at a friend's house in Calgary and I loved it and asked for the recipe. Now I make it all the time. It's healthy and delicious and here it is:

Mix together:

2 cups quick oats

1/2 cup red river cereal

2 Tbsp butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 Tbsp salt

Then add 2 cups boiling water

While that cools stir together in a small bowl:

Tbsp or 1 packet instant yeast

1 1/2 tsp of sugar

1/2 cup warm water

Once the first mixture is lukewarm you can add the yeast and water mixture and stir it all up.

Then add:

2 cups of whole wheat flour

1 1/2 cups of all purpose flour

Knead or mix with a mixer until easy to handle (doesn't stick to your hands like crazy but you can poke it a bit and your finger comes out without strings of dough). If it seems to sticky add more flour and knead some more. Grease a bowl and put the dough in there, flip it once so both sides are buttered with the grease, then cover with a cloth and let rise in warm place for about 30-40 minutes or until about double in size. I pre-heat my oven to 200, turn it off and put the dough in.

Punch it down and divide it in 2, rolling between your hands into loaf shapes and put into loaf pans. Cover with cloth again to keep warmth in so they can rise while you warm up your oven to 350 (5-10 minutes)

Stick them in for 30-35 minutes so that when you take it out and knock on the bottom it sounds hollow. That's it!

If you want you can change it up by substituting molasses or honey for the brown sugar or a mix of those. You can also do less oats and more flour, omit the Red River Cereal, or vary the amounts of types of flour - more white vs whole wheat. The more white flour that is used the lighter the dough is and it rises faster and more. As long as the amount of dry ingredients stays about the same in the end. Although I find that with whole wheat flour less is needed than with white.

Have fun!