Bread Baking - Going from White Flour to Whole Wheat
Updated on
March 01, 2015
D.B.
asks from
Hopkins, MN
4
answers
ETA: Last night, there were 5 responses to this. This morning there are 2 new ones and the old ones are gone. What's up with the technical issues on this site???
HI ladies,
My cooking skills pretty much end at the baking department. It's not intuitive at all to me, and I know it requires more precision with measurements and quantities.
I'd like to know a good way to adapt a white-flour recipe to one with more whole wheat flour. I realize it's not a life-or-death issue but I do think there's a bit more nutrition and fiber in the whole wheat. Specifically, I'm making a braided challah bread. I started with the typical all-purpose flour recipe, then on the advice of friends added some bread flour, and also looked at some recipes with partial use of whole wheat flour. I'm not sure if what I have now as a recipe is based on anything but trial and error.
The basic recipe alls for 8 cups of white flour, 3 eggs, 1.5 T of yeast, 1.75 C water, 1/2 C sugar, 1/2 C oil plus 1 T salt. This seems to be pretty standard, from Joan Nathan (the guru of Jewish cooking) to many other sources. I'm now using 3 C bread flour, 3 C whole wheat, and 2 C regular white flour. I find I can only do about 7 cups in the mixer fitted with dough hooks so I add the last cup in as I knead the last part and roll out the "ropes" for braiding. (There still seems to be plenty of flour in the mixing bowl that doesn't get mixed in before I put the dough aside to rise for an hour.)
I'm posting a link to an awesome video on braiding techniques in my SWH. My "ropes" seem to pull back though and not say as long as when I roll them. Part of it may be due to the fact that I'm using a cutting board that seems to slide around a bit. Should I just bite the bullet and roll them on the counter top itself, and just deal with the cleaning afterwards? Or is it my technique that's at fault, or the recipe?
After I braid the loaves, I set them aside for about 30 minutes per the typical instructions. Then I brush with an egg wash. But I find there are "stretch marks" (pardon the phrase!) where the ropes cross that I don't see with other challahs. What am I doing wrong? Is it the flours used in the recipe, or something else?
The bread tastes fine, and better than the supermarket challah in town. We don't have a bread bakery nearby. Mine just doesn't look the same as others' versions. It's also not as dark on the outside crust as many others - more golden than brown. I worry about baking it too long though. Or maybe this is the result of baking multiple loaves on 2 racks at the same time?
Here's the link for the wonderful braiding video. It's in Hebrew but I don't understand enough of it to get any benefit from the audio - so just enjoy the video as I did! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RblfXecu9lo
The above link is a wonderful guide to incorporating whole wheat flour into bread doughs.
You might try adding Vital Wheat Gluten to your recipe. Vital Wheat Gluten is available in most large grocery stores - it usually comes in a small box like a little pancake mix box, or Bob's Red Mill sometimes sells it in bags. Whole wheat flour contains less gluten than white flour. My husband always adds Vital Wheat Gluten to his bread doughs. The box lists measurements: usually it's about a teaspoon of gluten per cup of flour.
Another good resource is http://www.craftybaking.com/how-baking-works. Challah breads and brioche breads that contain a lot of eggs sometimes require help in the gluten department if you're subbing in another kind of flour. Due to the number of eggs in your recipe, I'd suggest adding gluten. The Vital Wheat Gluten is just a powdery, flour-like, easily measured substance.
Hope that helps!
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S.T.
answers from
Washington DC
on
50% substitution usually works just fine without having to tweak the amounts elsewhere. it's always worked for me.
khairete
S.
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D.K.
answers from
Pittsburgh
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You should be able to substitute up to 50% whole wheat flour without changing the recipe so you are fine there. I think you may need to let the 'ropes' relax for a few minutes after rolling before you braid them. It's like once you punch down your dough it goes from being soft and pliable to really elastic and at that point you can't do to much with it until the gluten relaxes a little again. Adding milk to your egg wash can improve the color of the loaf but it won't be parve then (if that matters to you).
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J.K.
answers from
Wausau
on
When you go from white to 100% whole wheat, you need to add a little Vital Wheat Gluten - because whole wheat has less gluten, therefore is less stretchy and can have formation issues - and a bit more liquid, because the VWG sucks it up. :-)
