Whole Wheat Yeast Bread

Today I made some whole wheat bread again, a different recipe I have never tried before of course. Although the bread did not rise as much as I had hoped it would, it still turned out very well. The lack of rise may be due to the little mini crisis situation I had. I had already started mixing up the bread dough when I realized that there was absolutely no yeast left in the house. Oops, poor planning and inventory checks, and especially unfortunate because a trip to the grocery store had been made earlier today. Oh well, good thing the store isn't too far away, so a quick trip was made. Meanwhile, I hoped the warm water wasn't getting too cold. The closest store only carried traditional yeast, not rapid rise yeast like I usually use, but I din't think that would be a problem, as I have used traditional yeast before. It wasn't until after I had arrived home and added the yeast to my now only lukewarm water that I realized the bread recipe actually called for instant yeast. To my knowledge, the only difference between traditional yeast and instant yeast is that instant yeast does not require a separate proofing and can just be added to the dry ingredients. Since the recipe called for the yeast to be added to the warm water anyway, I simply let it sit for 10 minutes to activate. After 10 minutes, the mixture seemed to be quite bubbly, so I continued on with the recipe. After the first rising of the dough, the dough seemed to be quite high, so I figured it would all work out. After the second rising, the dough was not quite as high as it probably should have been, and it did not rise much in the oven. Oh well, still tasty. However, take a few lessons from this fiasco: always check to make sure you have the ingredients you need, preferably before you go out, but definitely before you begin your baking. Also read the recipe carefully before beginning. Luckily this bread recipe is fairly forgiving.

Now, to the actual bread recipe. It is fairly simple, with not many ingredients. Just water, sugar, salt, yeast, butter, and flour. Of course I spruced it up a little to suit my liking. I added some ground flax seed and some sunflower seeds and used all whole wheat flour to make the bread more hearty and nutritious. The recipe simply calls for one large amount of all-purpose flour, but this could easily be varied with any variety of grains to suit your tastes. As I mentioned before, this is a very forgiving and versatile recipe. It is also fairly basic, and could probably be changed up by the addition of molasses, honey or brown sugar, and eggs and milk. The amounts of sugar, butter, and salt could also be varied to suit personal tastes.