Heavy Wholemeal !

[bakerboy]

Hi,
No matter what I do I can never seem to make a decent wholemeal loaf, its always stodgy and heavy, I use a breville breadmaker and Hovis flour.
I'm always open to suggestions, any ideas????

[Caz]

Try using the Malted wholemeal bread improver in the Kitchen Foods shop, I use it all the time, I do add a little more water to wholemeal too, if all else fails try half white bread flour.

[Emma]

Maybe its worth investing in a Kenwood style dough mixer, with these you can extend the mixing time to make sure the dough is kneaded or developed enough, this is crucial with wholemeals and is where breadmakers tend to fail with there small paddle blade.

[doughboy]

(16-03-2009 09:20 AM)Emma Wrote:  Maybe its worth investing in a Kenwood style dough mixer, with these you can extend the mixing time to make sure the dough is kneaded or developed enough, this is crucial with wholemeals and is where breadmakers tend to fail with there small paddle blade.

The part about mixing for longer is not quite true. Any baker worth his(or her) salt knows that wholemeal doughs are mixed for a shorter time than white doughs. This is because of the bran on the flour which has a cutting effect on the develped gluten. Overmixing of wholemeal & brown doughs, almost always overdevelops the the dough and often leads to crumbly, difficult to butter, bread. If using a Kenwood type mixer, try mixing for two minutes on slow and four minutes fast. If using a breadmaker, use the fastest setting.
Finally, brown and wholemeal breads will always be denser (seem heavier) this is because of the fibre in the flour - you cannot make fibre rise!!!