Steve's high-protein, high-fiber, low-carb bread
I've enjoyed baking bread for twenty years, and expected to really miss
it when we started low-carbing in April 2003. As soon as we got
past the two-week "induction" phase, I started experimenting with
ingredients, and after much trial and error, came up with the
following, which
- tastes good, not at all like sawdust
- slices well: if you wish, you can slice it as thin as 1/3"
without it falling apart
- contains no "weird" ingredients
- has about 9 g protein, 7 g carbs, 2 g fiber, and 3 g fat per
normal-sized slice
- has a reasonable bread texture, albeit a little spongier than
you're expecting, and
- did I mention, tastes good?
So here we go. The following makes 4 loaves, each a little under
a pound and a half: I usually freeze one loaf's worth of dough for
pizza, freeze one of the baked loaves, and eat the other two over the
course of a week. Feel free to scale this down.
Ingredients
- 4 cups water
- 1-4 Tbsp. honey, molasses, maple syrup, etc. (Artificial
sweetener won't work, but this is a tiny amount of sugar in 4 loaves of
bread, and the yeast will eat most of it before you do anyway.)
- 1-2 packets dried yeast. (I plan to try this with an
ongoing yeast culture, but haven't done that experiment yet.)
- 6 eggs
- 1/4 to 1/2 cup vegetable oil (canola, grapeseed, corn, sunflower,
or "light" olive)
- 2 cups soy powder (I use Fearn)
- 2 cups whole wheat flour (I use King Arthur)
- 2 Tbsp. salt or KCl. (Do not reduce this; if you use less
than 1 Tbsp. salt per cup of soy flour, it'll taste like sawdust.)
- 1/2 cup flaxseed or flaxseed meal
- 1/2 cup wheat germ
- optional: 1/2 cup
buckwheat flour, or oat flour, or your favorite high-fiber flour
- 1/2 cup wheat bran
- optional: 1/4 to 1/2 cup
whole wheat berries, whole oat berries or steel-cut
oats. combined with an equal amount of water and microwaved on low
power for a few minutes.
- 4-6 cups wheat gluten (I use Bob's Red Mill)
Directions
- Heat half of the water to a little above body temperature.
- Pour into large mixing bowl.
- Mix in honey and yeast with a wire whisk.
- Let sit for a few minutes while you crack eggs into a separate bowl.
- Once the yeast mixture has generated a thick "foam" on top of the
liquid, add eggs, oil, and remaining water and mix with whisk.
- Mix in soy powder, salt, and whole wheat flour with whisk.
- Mix in flaxseed, wheat germ, wheat bran, and optional other flours with whisk.
- Switch utensils from whisk to wooden spoon; mix some more.
- Add optional whole grains.
- Add wheat gluten, a cup at a time, until you can't use the spoon any more.
- Switch utensils from wooden spoon to hands.
- Turn dough out onto board or counter floured with wheat gluten; knead 100 strokes, adding wheat gluten as necessary to keep it from sticking.
- Put dough back into bowl, put in a warm, moist place (or a warm place and use a plant mister), cover with a cloth, and let rise for two hours or so.
- Punch down the dough, turn out onto aforementioned board or counter, and knead another 50 strokes.
- Divide dough in fourths.
- Knead each fourth about 25 strokes, shape into loaves, and put into buttered or oiled loaf pans.
- (I often slash the tops with a sharp knife "to give it leave to rise".)
- Put loaf pans in aforementioned warm, moist place, cover with a cloth, and let rise for two hours or so.
- Heat oven to 350-400 Fahrenheit.
- (I often put a pan of hot water into the oven to keep the humidity up while the bread is baking.)
- optional: brush surface of loaves with water (for a
thin, crisp crust), milk (for a softer, dark crust), egg yolk (for a
golden crust), or egg white (for a crisp, dark crust).
- Bake for 30-40 minutes or until it looks and sounds done.
- Let cool on wire racks before ripping it open.
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Stephen Bloch /
sbloch@adelphi.edu