Honey Whole Wheat and Flax Seed Bread

With so much honey flowing into our kitchen, I’ve been experimenting more lately with replacing other sugars with honey, and trying to adapt favorite recipes along the way.  There’s a few main points to remember when replacing sugar with honey, and I’ll explain them in reference to my new adapted bread recipe.

First, honey “tastes sweeter” than sugar, so you actually should use less honey than sugar called for in the recipe. My bread recipe originally called for 1/2 cup brown sugar, plus 2 tablespoons of honey, plus 1 teaspoon of sugar for proofing the yeast.  In my new recipe I simply use 1/2 cup of honey and call it good.

Second, honey is a liquid, so you need to subtract from the total amount of liquid called for in the recipe by how much honey you use.  My recipe called for 2 1/2 cups buttermilk, but since I am using honey I only use 2 cups of buttermilk.

Finally, you can’t use honey in place of sugar when it is structurally necessary for the recipe.  In many cookie recipes, for example, the sugar and butter must be creamed together.  The sugar crystals actually cut into the butter making little pockets for air to aid in the final structure of the baked good.  I might try slowly replacing some sugar in a cookie recipe and see how much I could get away with substituting, but I would never try to just swap it right out.  This isn’t a necessary consideration for my bread, however, and–I’m realizing–more and more recipes I try.

I’ve successfully adapted my recipe for bread to use honey rather than sugar.  I’ve made it a few times, so I’m ready to share it.  In the summer it’s always harder for me to work up the desire to turn my oven on–so I’ve been trying to bake a bunch of bread at once.  (This picture shows four loaves of the honey whole wheat and flax seed bread, and the round loaf on the right is a leftover oatmeal bread loaf.)

Honey Whole Wheat and Flax Seed Bread

1/2 cup honey
2 tsp salt
2 cups warmed buttermilk*
2 Tbsp butter, melted, or oil
5 cups of whole wheat flour, divided
1/3 cup of ground flax seed meal**
1 Tbsp yeast
1/2 cup warm water
1 tsp honey***
2-3 cups unbleached AP or bread flour

In large mixer bowl, mix first 4 ingredients together. Add 3 cups of the whole wheat flour and 1/3 cup of ground flax seed meal to cooled mixture. Blend at low speed until moist; then beat at medium speed for three minutes to begin developing gluten.

Mix yeast into water and honey and let proof. Add last 2 cups of whole wheat flour to bowl, and add the yeast mixture–after it has started to rise. Mix all together well. Stir in 2-3 cups white flour, 1/2 cup at a time, until dough pulls cleanly away from the sides of the bowl. Knead until dough is smooth and elastic, at least 7 minutes in mixer or 10-15 minutes by hand. Place dough in greased bowl, flip the dough over so the oily side is on top, cover with a towel. Let rise in warm place until doubled–about an hour. Gently degas (“punch down”) dough, divide into 2 loaves and form into loaf shapes. Place in greased bread pans and let rise again until dough is about 1 inch above pan edges.(About 30-45 minutes)  Slice 1/4 inch depth down the the center of each loaf.****  Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes–or until loaves sound hollow when lightly rapped.***** Remove from pans immediately. Cool and enjoy.

My personal notes:

*Sometimes I use buttermilk, sometimes I use milk with 1 Tbl lemon juice added, I’ve used reconstituted powdered milk with lemon juice added, and you could even use just water, but the bread would not be as rich.

**Fresh ground meal has more nutrients, but flax seeds are difficult to grind.  I’ve tried unsuccessfully in a food processor, and my hand grain mill.  What I do is store my flax seeds in the fridge, and when I need meal I mix it about half and half with the wheat berries (grains) and find that I can grind that pretty well through my hand grinder.  You can try that if you want, realizing that it goes against the instructions of many grain mills, or you can use pre-ground meal, or simply replace it with more wheat flour.

***I measure out my 1/2 cup of honey into a 1 cup glass measuring cup.  I pour it out into the mixing bowl and set aside.  When it’s time for my yeast, I take that measuring cup with the honey residue left in it, fill it with 1/2 cup of warm water and the yeast and mix them all up.  I find there is enough honey left in the glass to get the yeast going nicely, and I don’t have to stress about scraping every last bit of honey out back at the first step.

****It’s my un-scientifically-proven beleif that splitting the top allows the dough to raise just a little bit more when being placed into the oven before the crust forms, allowing the bread to be just a little bit more airy, which for wheat bread is very appreciated.

*****Alternately I bake to an internal temperature of 190*F.