Whistle - Here you go.... 1. Scalded the milk and cooled it. Mixed warm milk, warmed water and o.j., egg and agave nectar (or honey if you are using it) in the bottom of the pan. 2. Mixed together flours (and vital wheat gluten and flaxmeal, if used) and add to the top of the liquids. 3. Add the yeast to the top of the flour. (Note I added the fat and salt later during the kneading. It takes stress off the bread machine with this much bulk to mix the dough WITHOUT the salt. The gluten develops quicker, and once the salt is added, the gluten strands tighten up making kneading a little more difficult. 4. Set Zo. on QUICK DOUGH. Press START. 5. After 5 minutes of mixing/kneading, be sure to check to make sure the dough has the correct hydration and adjust it if you need to. You want a nice soft dough ball. 6. After 10 minutes of kneading (or when it looks like the gluten is developing nicely, add the melted butter and salt. When the add-in beep sounds, add 1/2-3/4 c. multi-grain cereal (if using it - I milled a mixture of barley, rye, triticale, spelt, oats and rice). 7. When the kneading is complete, remove the dough from the pan and place in a dough rising bucket (or however you normally work your dough). DO NOT allow the dough to rise in the bread machine because this is more dough than suggested for the machine. 8. Allow the dough to rise to just under double. Punch down. Divide dough (I had 3 portions that weighed around 1-lb. 2-oz. each. Round the dough (so you have the ball formed into a tight ball with NO shaggy edges from the dough being cut, and the gluten strands are going from the top to the bottom of the ball), cover (I use plastic wrap) and allow to rest 10-15 minutes so the gluten can relax. Form, cover (plastic wrap), and allow to rise to just under double...... I made one portion into 9 dinner rolls (8-inch square pan) and baked the bread in 8"x4-1/2" NORPRO pans, but I also use heavy-gauge Calphalon pans that are the same size, or will use some ancient Bake King loaf pans that are 7-1/2"x3-1/2" (for dough amounts between 12-16 ounces). If the dough is over 1-pound, I'll use the larger pans. I baked my loaves to 200°F. when tested with an instant read thermometer. -Grainlady

The crumb will be dense if you use a straight dough (aka direct dough) method for 100% whole wheat flour bread. This is the "modern" bread-making method designed for making bread quickly using processed bleached and unbleached flour, and is not a great choice for wholegrain breads. If this is your preferred method and you are making the bread by hand, make sure you do a good job mixing the flour into the liquid ingredients. I'd suggest a Danish Dough Whisk for this task, but a good wooden spoon will also work. Add the flour a little at a time and make sure it's mixed well before adding more flour. By mixing, I mean you beat it with the spoon 50 or more strokes before adding more flour. Add the flour until you don't have the strength to beat it anymore - you may have several hundred strokes invested in mixing. It's okay to take a rest during mixing. Letting the mixture sit will allow the dry ingredients to absorb moisture, so take a 5-minute rest if necessary. Taking care to mix the ingredients well will develop the gluten as well, and this is a step that is often rushed and done incorrectly. If you toss a shaggy mess of dough out to be kneaded, you haven't done a good job of mixing. You'll actually get better results with wholegrain flour if you use a sponge method. This is a method where the yeast, liquid and a portion of the flour are beaten together and allowed to sit anywhere from 30-minutes to overnight - experts say 2-1/2 hours is optimum. The bran has time to soften and soak up the liquid, and the gluten will also have time to develop without manipulation (kneading). Those sharp shards of bran will actually cut the gluten strands during kneading, resulting in short squatty loaves and dense crumb. There is also a substance in wheat germ called Glutathione that affects the gluten development. Adding an acid to the recipe (lemon juice, vinegar, ascorbic acid) will not only help prevent the gluten bonds from breaking down; but it will help repair gluten bonds. Soaking the flour in an acid medium (using whey, yogurt/kefir, buttermilk, vinegar or lemon juice) is another method. I suggest adding 1/8 t. ascorbic acid crystals per loaf of bread to the flour mixture (or half of a 250 mg vitamin C tablet crushed using two teaspoons, per 2-loaves). If you happen to have some Fruit Fresh on hand, you can use it as the acid ingredient. Only use an acid in bread made with baker's yeast, not naturally-leavened bread (those made with a starter - aka sourdough bread) because naturally-leavened breads are already acidic from fermentation. I've never found additional gluten necessary, even milling my own flour. The only time I added vital wheat gluten is if there was a very large percentage of low- or gluten-free flour in the recipe. I'd also suggest using a quality bread machine (and highly recommend a Zojirushi bread machine) for making dough. That's what they use in the King Arthur Test Kitchen for mixing and kneading bread dough, and they claim it's better than by-hand or with a stand mixer. Several years ago, King Arthur had pictures in their catalogue showing the difference between a 100% whole wheat recipe made in a stand mixer and the dough made in a Zojirushi Bread Machine and baked in a loaf pan. The one made in the Zo was about 1-inch taller than the same recipe made in a stand mixer. Stand mixers tend to aerate the dough, while the Zo does what it's designed to do, knead the dough. I'll include a link to Sue Greggs 2-Stage method, which includes more information. -Grainlady Here is a link that might be useful: Sue Gregg - 2-Stage Bread Method This post was edited by grainlady on Fri, Dec 6, 13 at 11:07

Yes, white whole wheat flour can be used for cookies. And yes, there is hard and soft white wheat as plllog explained. There are also spring hard/soft white or red wheat and winter hard/soft white or red wheat to get even more complicated than things really need to be. And don't forget durum wheat (the type of wheat best used for pasta/noodles) and all the ancient varieties. Before going gluten free, I used a large number of wheat varieties: durum, hard spring white, hard winter white, soft spring white, hard winter red, hard spring red, triticale (a hybrid of wheat and rye), as well as spelt, kamut, and einkorn (ancient varieties). I saved soft white wheat (because it was so expensive -purchased from Bob's Red Mill) for some (not all) quick breads, biscuits, and pastry, as well as for cakes (especially delicate chiffon and angel food cake). I would use a 3:1 mix of soft white wheat and spelt OR oat groats (milling flour myself) for a low-protein flour similar in protein to cake flour. I also milled rye, barley, sorghum, and many other grains/seeds/beans for flour. I milled the mixture of grains into a very fine flour and made sure to sift it (removing any large pieces of bran) before using it for cake. Since you may not have any soft white wheat flour available for your cookies, just make sure when making cookies (or anything leavened with chemical leavening - soda, baking powder) NOT to over-mix them or you will develop too much gluten and will get tough cookies or baked goods using regular (hard) white whole wheat flour. This is yet another time I suggest using a Danish Dough Whisk (or a wooden spoon) instead of a stand or regular mixer. Keep mixing to a minimum once the flour has been added. If you use white whole wheat flour in a recipe that is designed for bleached or unbleached all-purpose flour, you may find you need to add a little more hydration, OR reduce the amount of whole wheat flour by 1-tablespoon from each cup of flour called for in the recipe, and adjust accordingly, if needed. If you can find recipes that specifically call for whole wheat flour you will find you have better results until you get accustomed to using it. Check your public library for wholegrain cookbooks. The recipe at the link below from the Kansas Wheat Commission is one of my favorites using 100% whole wheat flour :-). This recipe will work with either white or red whole wheat flour, but white whole wheat works best due to the flavor differences. If you want to kick it up a notch, add 1/8-1/4 t. of Fiori di Sicilia (an all-natural citrus and vanilla scented flavoring from King Arthur Flour - but caution, a little goes a long way). You may want to take a look at their recipe collection for a lot of great recipes using whole wheat flour. I've collected the Kansas Wheat Commission Recipe Books for years (free when you attend the Kansas State Fair in Hutchinson, KS) and have them going back several decades. -Grainlady Here is a link that might be useful: Whole Wheat Sugar Cookies

The flour I used is Bob's Red Mill 100% Stone Ground Whole Wheat. I bought it at Bristol Farms in Westchester, and it was getting close to its "use by" date, but it is still perfectly fine. It only has one more month to go, however! I seem to have more problems with rye flour cutting the strands of gluten than I do with whole wheat, but I do always add VWG to rye bread, and the last rye bread came out exactly as I wanted it to. I think I'll have to keep a closer watch on my second rise of the next bread, especially if I bake it in a 9x5 loaf pan. I prefer to use this size pan because the Pullman pan makes a loaf that is a bit large for us to use up in six days, which I think is as long as I want to keep bread without freezing. This current loaf tastes so good that I might be eating too much of it, and I am trying to limit my carbs. I'm not supposed to eat more than one slice a day, but I made an exception yesterday. It doesn't taste nearly as good today as it did yesterday, but it makes good toast for sandwiches.