Ed and Ruth Honey Whole Wheat Bread

E & R Bread
Named so because when my dad retired my mom had to make room for him in her kitchen. Every week or so they made their bread primarily for toasting to have for breakfast each morning. This bread is very flavorful, heavy and sweet. This recipe makes 4 loaves.

3 ½ C. milk (they always used evaporated milk and so do I)
½ C. butter
3 tsp. salt
½ C. brown sugar
2/3 C. honey
1 C. warm water
Melt the butter, add the remaining ingredients, heat to 115 degrees (use your candy thermometer here) I would heat it in the micro wave a bit at a time to avoid scorching the milk.

3 pkgs. Dry yeast
1 Tbsp. sugar
½ C. warm water
Dissolve the yeast and sugar in the water and allow it work just a bit.

2 lrg. eggs, slightly beaten
6 C. bread flour (Robin Hood is high in wheat gluten and works better than say Gold Metal)
6 C. Whole Wheat flour (it cost more but I like King Arthur for this)

In a large bowl (I use my Kitchenaid mixer for this) start with 4 cups of the bread flour and blend in the milk mixture and blend well. Add in the eggs and yeast mixture, again, blend well. Add in the 6 cups of whole wheat flour a cup at a time and blend well. You should then have 2 cups of bread flour that remains. Add in enough of the remaining bread flour to form a smooth elastic dough. (Being an old fashion type, I just knead this last 2 cups in on my work surface.) Place the dough in a large greased bowl, turning it to grease all sides (I usually use PAM for this). Cover loosely with plastic wrap and a cloth towel. Let raise in a warm place (80-90 degrees, I set the bowl on a heating pad on medium) until double, about 1 hour.

Turn the dough out on to your lightly floured work surface and punch it down. Divide the dough into 4 equal parts. Cover and let rest for 15 minutes. Knead and shape each portion and place in a into loaf pans (mine are roughly 9.5X 5.5X3” pans) that have been sprayed with PAM. Brush the top of each loaf with melted butter and, again, let raise in a warm place until double or about 1 hour.

Bake in a preheated oven @ 350F for about 35 minutes or until the loaves sound hollow when lightly tapped in top.
Turn out of the pans straight out of the oven and return to right side up on a cooling rack. (I like to again brush the tops lightly with butter. Allow to completely cook before bagging. If you can keep your hands off it, allow the bread to cool before cutting. A serrated knife works best.

This bread is not your store purchased bread. As I said this is a hearty, flavorful, heavy bread that lends itself well to toast in the morning. It freezes well. I have found that Hefty “Baggies” storage bags(gallon size) work well if the loaves aren’t really high, otherwise, I am afraid that you will need to stop at the bakery counter of you local super market and purchase a few of their bread bags or keep some that you have finished from purchased bread.