Whole Wheat and Sprouted Grain Bread

The first time I ever sprouted seeds (mung beans to be exact) was for a Biology experiment in High School.  It amazed me to see how these seemingly lifeless grains suddenly awaken to new life with just a mere soak in water.  Fifteen years later, seeing this transformation is still incredible to me and I felt like a kid again doing a fun science experiment in the kitchen.  

Oat Bran Broom Bread

This is another delicious and healthy bread that I made a few days ago from Peter Reinhart's Whole Grain Breads.  I've been having such great results making breads from this book that I'm tempted to bake through all of the recipes! Well maybe not all -- a whole wheat panettone doesn't sound appealing to me at all LOL.  I believe there's something about using a soaker and biga and leaving them to ferment for at least 8 hours (thus going through a gradual autolyse period) that allows for the development of flavors and enzymes which makes a very good loaf of bread.  

Multigrain Struan

The first time I stumbled upon a version of Peter Reinhart's Struan bread was in his award-winning book, The Bread Baker's Apprentice. He named it "Multigrain Bread Extraordinaire" in BBA because it really is quite an extraordinary multigrain bread -- you get at least 5 kinds of fiber-dense and nutrition-packed whole grains all in one delicious loaf! The great thing about this bread too is that you can use virtually any kind of grain that you like or available to you -- just make sure to follow the exact proportions listed in the recipe for the grains as well as pre-cook the larger kinds (like rice) prior to soaking. In his version of the struan found in his book Whole Grain Breads (which is also the version I made here), PR made it even a lot healthier by using 100% whole wheat flour instead of the usual unbleached all-purpose flour and also gave the option of using soy milk or rice milk instead of buttermilk or full fat milk/yogurt for the soaker.