Homemade Whole Wheat Bread with Quinoa Recipe

Is there anything better in this life than homemade bread?

Yes! It's homemade whole wheat bread with quinoa! Delicious AND healthy AND whole wheat AND quinoa!

No!

YES! It can be done.

A running friend shared her whole wheat bread recipe with me earlier this year. I tried it and my family really liked it. Up to this point, the whole wheat bread I've made is better suited to holding heavy doors open rather than being ingested. Not good. My family refused to eat it, especially after the first day when it was at least warm out of the oven and half way edible.

This new recipe passed with flying colors. It's fluffy and light and tasty! Fresh out of the oven or sliced for sandwiches a few days later. It makes awesome toast!

My friend had mentioned that she likes to make it with quinoa and although she never shared how to do that in her recipe, I was intrigued. I have a couple of bags of quinoa sitting around my house, but beyond making it for breakfast or the occasional random recipe, I have no idea what to do with it. I was determined to figure out how to get that healthy, protein-packed quinoa into my bread and I was pleasantly surprised to have it work on the very first try. The bread was actually even more moist.

I will share this recipe with the way I added in the quinoa. If you don't have any quinoa or just don't want to add it, then replace it with a little more bread flour. (What's a "little more"? Ehh...Less than half a cup, but "feel" it out.) Recipe makes one loaf of bread, but can be easily doubled or more to make more loaves at once.

Homemade Whole Wheat Bread WITH Quinoa

Ingredients:
1 TBSP yeast
1/2 tsp sugar

3 TBSP water

2 TBSP brown sugar
2 TBSP butter, melted
1 cup water

2 cups wheat flour
1/2 cup prepared quinoa (rinse and prepare quinoa with water according to package directions)
1.5 cups bread flour


Directions:
Mix yeast and sugar and 3 TBSP water in a large cup. Let it sit for about 10 minutes, or until it rises.

In the meantime, mix one cup of water with the brown sugar and the butter. Add in the wheat flour and mix well. Add the yeast mixture and the prepared quinoa.

Add in the bread flour 1/2 cup at a time until you form a nice dough. The dough should feel a little sticky and soft.

Knead for about 10 minutes or until the dough is nice and elastic. Remember that you can't over knead the bread. The more you knead, the better.

Let rise, covered in a bowl for one hour or so until the dough is doubled in size.

Punch down the dough and form into a loaf. Place in a greased loaf pan and cover. Let rise until the dough starts coming up over the top of the loaf pan.

Cook in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes.

Also if you want a more grainy bread, you can substitute 1/2 cup of 7 or 9 grain cereal for 1/2 cup of the bread flour.

This recipe can be doubled, tripled, quadrupled. Maybe more. I've only ever made four loaves at once and it worked really well. Use one loaf. Let the others cool, bag them, and stick in the freezer until you are ready to use them.

P.S. While eating whole wheat bread is nourishing to the body, I have to say making bread is nourishing to the soul. I like making bread when I'm in a "mood". I set up the iPad on my kitchen counter, turn Pandora on to my Priscilla Ahn station, and knead away my melancholies. After ten minutes of kneading, I feel like a new woman.