16 May 2008

Oatmeal Bread

I splurged on some King Arthur's unbleached bread flour yesterday. I was curious to see if my challah would turn out better. On the package there is the following recipe for Oatmeal Bread:

3 cups bread flour
1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
2 tbsp butter
1.5 tsp salt
3 tbsp honey
2 tsp active dry yeast
1.25 cups lukewarm milk
0.75 cup raisins or currents (optional) (i skipped this)

1. Proof the yeast in the milk
2. Add all other ingredients
3. Knead by hand for 10 minutes or by machine for 5 minutes
4. Put dough in lightly greased bowl, cover and let sit for 1 hour (it might not double, but that's okay)
5. Shape into a log and put it in a lightly greased 9 x 5-inch loaf pan, cover and let rise for 1 to 1.5 hours, til it's crested 1 to 2 inches over the rim of the pan
6. Bake in a 350 degree heated oven for 35 to 40 minutes or until the center registers at 190 degrees.

I thought this sounded so good and had to try it out.





First off, when I covered the dough in the loaf pan (step 5 above) I covered it too tightly and didn't allow the dough to crest. Not sure why I did this. I mean, I really made sure that the plastic was on there tight. I was thinking that I shouldn't allow any air to get in. So I wrapped it with two pieces of plastic and pulled them both so tight. Needless to say, the bread did not rise properly and it turned out very dense and chewy. But it still tasted really good and I can't wait to try this out again. I normally don't eat jam or jelly on anything, but it seemed like it would go well. I just put it on half the bread cause I wasn't sure I'd like it. But oh my! It was so delicious! I had two slices. Caleb liked it okay, but he didn't seem overly impressed. I think it would go really great with peanut butter.

7 comments:

Joanna said...

Looks and sounds really yummy. I'm going to try it out.

Johanna said...

I love oatmeal bread and cannot wait to try this recipe! Thanks for posting it, Marie!

Unknown said...

if you guys haven't already, you should try out the bread flour. it's much finer than all-purpose flour. i know it might be hard to find room for it, but i think that will just provide more motivation to use it up quickly. i have the bag sitting on our island cause i have no where to put it, but i'm glad i tried it out. i do have a tupperware with some wheat flour, but i think the stuff is at least a year old. i should probably toss it, right?

Johanna said...

I would toss it. Wheat flour goes rancid pretty quickly. I tend to keep mine in the freezer to avoid that.

M said...

I have also heard that if you don't knead bread well enough that it tends to be very dense. I don't know if it is true or not. The one time I made bread lately, it felt like I kneaded it a lot, and it still turned out dense.

Unknown said...

yeah, i feel like i need to take a kneading class. i never feel like i'm doing it quite right. but, i'm sure this time, me trapping the dough in a confined space was the bigger culprit.

Unknown said...

FYI, I had a snack of this bread with peanut butter and a glass of milk and it was heaven!