homemade white bread vs. store-bought whole grain bread

[VBMama]

Your opinions?

I'm working to improve my bread-baking skills, but I'm still challenged by baking good whole wheat or whole grain sandwich bread and can't decide if I'm doing my family any favors by making homemade bread with mostly white flour as opposed to buying good quality ($$ grrr) whole grain from the store.

[mamadelbosque]

If I couldn't make good whole wheat bread, I'd buy it. Just cause its home made doesn't mean white bread is any better for you than wonder bread.

[allnaturalmom]

I would probably buy the good quality whole wheat bread if mine at home didn't turn out. I do think, however, that homemade from scratch w/good quality flour (unbleached/unbromated, etc..) white flour bread would still be a step up from your typical 'wonder bread' in that it wouldn't have additives, preservatives, bleached and/or bromated flour, etc...

I, too, have had trouble w/100% whole wheat flour bread until I tried the King Arthur Flour recipe. It's on the back of their whole wheat flour bag. It's a high-riser, light and delish! I also sub organic whole wheat flour for the regular whole wheat flour. :

gl
hth

[tinuviel_k]

Really, whole grain baking is not so bad. Here are the four tips that I find to be the most helpful when I make wholegrain bread.

1. Use 1 Tbsp wheat gluten per 1 cup of whole wheat flour. (Yes, wheat gluten is technically a refined flour, but 1/4 cup of it in a recipe using 4 cups of ww flour is a lot better than using white flour!)

2. Knead longer. I try to knead my ww bread about twice as long (maybe a bit less) than white bread.

3. Use enough liquid. I go for a borderline sticky dough with whole wheat. A stiff dough will not rise as well.

4. Use two risings, not three. I've found that with my ww bread rising once, shaping the loaves, and then rising again works much better than the traditional "rise, punch down, rise, shape, and rise again" method.

[sunkissedmumma67]

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[JennifaBest]

Personally I think that homemade white bread would be better than store bought wheat. Just for the fact that you are controlling the ingredients. You are probably using 5-10 ingredients rather than the 20-30 chemical/weird ingredients that prolong shelf-life in store-bought wheat bread.

[Magelet]

Maybe I'm going against the grain here, but I think the homemade white bread is better. You are making the bread with love for your family, which infuses it with love. Also, if you keep trying to make wheat bread, your expertise at white bread will help. Its a learning process, and if you resort to storebought, you won't learn it. I've heard the best way to learn to make ww bread is to start adding more and more ww slowly to your white bread, and make the adjustments you think it needs slowly, from your experience with bread.

[Daisie125]

I was in your shoes until I tried the whole wheat bread recipe here http://everydayfoodstorage.net/2009/...torage-recipes

It is seriously the BEST sandwich bread I have EVER had. It's soft like store bread.

[VBMama]

Thanks for all your thoughts. I've been thinking that even if I'm only succeeding at white bread, at least it is made with quality ingredients and with my own hands so that makes it okay. I would never buy wonder bread, when I buy bread I do buy high-quality. But I do need to have higher expectations for myself and keep working at those whole grain breads. Thanks for the recipe links & tips, I'll be giving them a try!

[katiesk]

keep going with your white bread and start incorporating small amounts of whole wheat and other grains.

[FitMOmmyOf2]

I agree with the other moms, it's still better than store bought and you keep trying! It takes a while to get the hang of it, trial and error! ;-)