A 100% whole wheat bread filled with walnuts and enriched with milk and honey. What's not to love?

I also decided to add a bit of sourdough discard to mine. Mostly to use it up. It's completely optional. Although you may find you need slightly less flour if omitting the starter since it increases the hydration by a small amount.

And I will admit that I got a bit impatient while kneading this bread and didn't get as much gluten development as I probalby should have. So the loaves tore themselves apart during proofing rather than puffing up into nice, smooth-topped loaves like I had hoped. They were still tasty! Just not as pretty or high-rising as I would have liked.

Walnut Wheat Bread

Slightly adapted from Bernard Clayton's New Complete Book of Breads

Ingredients

• ~800g hard (strong/high grade/bread) whole wheat flour, divided¹
• 3 1/4 tsp. instant yeast
• 2 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1/2 c. skim milk powder
• 2 1/4 c. hot water (~50°C)
• 1/4 c. honey
• ~125g sourdough discard (optional)
• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• 1 c. walnuts, chopped

Directions

1. Combine ~400g of the flour with the yeast, salt, and milk powder and mix well.
2. Add the water, honey, and sourdough discard (if using) and beat vigorously by hand or with a flat beater on a stand mixer for 2-3 minutes.
3. Add ~100g of the remaining flour and mix very well.
4. Add the butter and continue working in the remaining flour ~30g at a time until a soft, sticky dough forms.
5. Cover the dough and allow it to rest for 5-10 minutes.
6. Replace the flat beater with a dough hook or turn the dough out onto a well-floured surface and work in as much of the remaining flour as needed to form a supple, workable dough.
7. Knead for at least half an hour by hand or 8-10 minutes by hook.
8. Round the dough and place it in a covered bowl to rise at room temperature. First rise should take ~1 hour (give or take, depending on the temperature of your room.)
9. Once the dough is fully risen, knock it back and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface.
10. Press it flat and add the walnuts to the middle.
11. Fold the edges over so that the walnuts are enclosed in the centre.
12. Knead for a few minutes until the walnuts are fully incorporated and distributed throughout.
13. Divide the dough into two equal portions, round each one, cover, and rest for ~10 minutes.
14. Meanwhile, grease two 22x11cm (8.5x4.5") loaf pans.
15. Working with one portion at a time, press the dough flat, letter fold, roll up like a jelly roll, and place, seam-side-down into one of the prepared loaf pans. Repeat with remaining dough.
16. Cover and proof at room temperature. (This rise should take ~45 minutes, give or take.)
17. Preheat oven to 190°C (375°F).
18. Uncover loaves and bake at 190°C (375°F) until done (30-40 minutes).
19. Turn out onto a wire rack to cool.

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¹ Clayton has you mix half of the flour with the wet ingredients first to make a batter. Beat that to get a bit of gluten development. And then gradually add in the rest of the flour. I did that this time and that's how I've written up the instructions here. But I would be tempted to try it with the Laurel's Kitchen method of combining all of the dry ingredients first, making a well in the centre, pour in the wet ingredients, and then gradually incorporating the wet into the dry, working from the centre outward. That seems to work very well for most of their breads and it would be interesting to see if it made any difference with this one. Both approaches should have a similar effect. But... I'd still be curious to compare and contrast. ^Back