Sprouted Wheat Bread...Day 2

Sprouted Wheat, Day 2
This is the draining, rinsing, and sprouting day.

There is also a list of things for tomorrow...
For those just joining us, day one was yesterday. Drain the wheat and rinse. I do mine in a colander with holes just a little smaller than the wheat.

Make sure you get the fresh water all the way through the wheat. Rinsing is an important step. If not done enough, your wheat will start to ferment and smell like my son's socks after school. You want the wheat to smell fresh and clean. Think of it as giving the little wheat babies a change. You don't want them sitting in water either, just moist.

Once drained and rinsed, cover with a clean towel and tuck them in. Moisten the towel. Repeat this rinsing step about 3 times throughout the day. Just leave them in the colander, rinse getting all the wheat clean by digging you hand in and rinsing it. Cover back up with the towel. This will help the wheat to start sprouting.

These babies will start to show their little white toe heads. I'm repeating myself from day one: The spouting time is pivotal. If you let the sprouts get too far developed, what you will have is a gooey mess, instead of bread it will be like a glue log. So, be sure to look at the pictures I do so you can gauge when your wheat needs to be made into bread. This may be shorter than 3 days if your wheat is especially fresh or your home or sprouting area is warm. The biggest test beside the picture is the TASTE test. If the wheat tastes starchy, it is still good for bread. That is all the sprouting you want to happen. The rule is that the sprout root should not be any longer than the length of the grain of wheat itself. Any farther in the sprouting stage and it will go into a diastatic stage and the starch will be turned into sugars. At this point it will be too late for making bread. Great for salad, but not for dough. Incidentally, if over sprouted, you can still use them in regular whole what bread, but no more than 1/4 cup chopped to a loaf. These little power pellets will actually contribute to great yeast activity! It is called a diastatic malt if these sprouts are dried in a low temperature and then ground. This malt is the sugar young plants thrive on...no wonder yeast loves it! Very sweet, and great for bread in small amounts--once ground use only about 1/4 tsp per loaf.

Tomorrow on dough making day these sprouts should weigh about 4 lb (2 k)--for 2 loaves. You started with 2 1/2 lb wheat, or 1135g) which will be a little more than 3 quarts sprouted. This recipe is from The Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book, 1984, by Laurel Robertson... one of my heroes in whole grain bread baking!

You will also need for 2 loaves:

Your meat grinder or electric food processor

2 tsp yeast (1/4 oz, or 7 g) [You can double this amount]

1/4 cup warm water (60 ml)

1/3 cup honey (80 ml)

4 tsp salt (22 g)

non-stick cooking spray for coating the pan ( I mix a little oil with a little flour--bit more natural)

2 , 8 by 4 inch loaf pans

1 clean towel

2 gallon size bags

If you are making a single loaf, you will need:

6 cups sprouted wheat berries (if you started with 1 1/4 lb or 575 g hard wheat)

1 tsp active dry yeast (1/8 oz or 3.5 g)[you can double this amount]

2 T warm water (30 ml)

2 tsp salt (11g)

3 T,scant, honey (40ml)

1 8 by 4 inch loaf pan

1 clean towel

1 gallon size bag

One final note:

The grain needs to be chilled overnight. So at the end of the day, put the wheat in a bowl and transfer it to the fridge. It can remain in the fridge 1-2 days before it needs to be made into bread so don't panic if something comes up and you can't use it right away. Just be sure again, not to let the roots get much longer than the grain of wheat.