Crispy on the outside and deliciously soft on the inside, but not too soft – that’s exactly what our flavoursome wholemeal bread recipe with spelt flour, rye meal, wholemeal flour and sugar beet kraut is like. Easy to make with just a few steps, but this wholemeal bread needs some time to swell and bake at a low temperature.
In Germany, people love bread, especially dark bread. The selection of different types of bread is sometimes almost impenetrable and yet every bread has its justification. It feels like there are only more varieties of bread rolls and Danish pastries.
We would like to introduce you to another bread that we love to bake and make ourselves a really delicious dark bread that is easy to bake with our wholemeal bread recipe.
Wholemeal bread recipe with spelt flour
Spelt flour and wholemeal spelt flour are the ingredients of this bread. We always try to eat a little less white wheat flour, although even spelt flour belongs to the plant genus wheat. However, it is still considered an ancient grain and is therefore said to be healthier. However, there are no particular advantages in terms of nutritional value and gluten content.
Wholemeal flour is always really healthy and satiating for longer, i.e. rich in fibre. However, the difference between wholemeal spelt and wholemeal wheat is not extreme. Nevertheless, it somehow feels better to use spelt flour instead of wheat flour like in our wholemeal bread recipe.
If, like us, you are looking for a good intermediate solution, wholemeal flour is easy to mix with white flour and you get a mixture in your bread that even wholemeal newcomers won’t find too organic. Switching from sweet brioche to this wholemeal bread recipe will make a big difference.
Bread topping on wholemeal bread
Wholemeal bread is suitable for many different toppings. It tastes great with traditional cold cuts such as sausage and cheese, but also with smear cheese and other exotic products from the chiller cabinet, such as salmon salad or meat salad. Those who like it sweeter will enjoy their bread with jam or chocolate cream. Boiled eggs or fried eggs also go perfectly with this wholegrain bread recipe.
To make the wholemeal bread recipe even healthier, add an avocado to the fried egg and finely slice a few radishes on top. Season lightly with olive oil, salt and pepper and nothing else is needed.
Wholemeal bread with coarse rye meal
When I first saw the recipe, I was worried that you would surely only be able to get rye meal from a health food shop or a mill, but I was wrong. Rye meal was quite normal with all the other types of flour on the supermarket shelf.
When you know how healthy wholemeal flour is, it’s easy to think that rye meal must be even healthier. It is very coarse and has a low degree of grinding, but it is not healthier than wholemeal flour; if anything, it changes the structure of the bread slightly.
All in all, the bread with rye meal needs time to swell before it can continue with yeast. In our bread recipe, the different types of flour are mixed with part of the sugar beet kraut and part of the buttermilk.
Wholemeal bread recipe with sugar beet kraut
A dark wholemeal bread recipe with sugar beet kraut, that sticky, dark, gooey substance. Similar to molasses, but slightly thinner, sugar beet kraut gives the bread its colour and sweetness. Sugar beet kraut is not extremely sweet at all, but rather sweet-tart-fruity.
I use sugar beet kraut in my recipe, but you can get a similar result by replacing it with honey, maple syrup or agave syrup. However, it’s better to use a little less here and slowly approach the flavour you want in your bread.
The sugar beet kraut gives the bread its beautiful dark colour and special taste, which is a little reminiscent of pumpernickel. If you would like to bake the bread without light-coloured spelt flour, you can also find the result on our recipe blog. The wholemeal bread then becomes even darker and more intense, but also a little firmer.
Delicious wholemeal bread recipe with rye meal
Das dunkle Brot wird für drei Stunden lang bei nur 150 Grad gebacken. Danach folgt noch eine halbe Stunde bei 100 Grad. Durch die niedrigere Temperatur verbrennt das Rübenkraut im Brot nicht. Das Brot backt einfach länger und langsam durch.
Wholemeal bread recipe with spelt flour and rye meal
Equipment
- 1 stand mixer
- 1 wire rack
Ingredients
- 250 g wholegrain spelt flour
- 250 g white spelt flour
- 250 g rye meal
- 10 g salt
- 375 ml buttermilk
- 125 ml buttermilk
- 75 g sugar beet kraut dark sugar beet molasses
- 75 g sugar beet kraut dark sugar beet molasses
- 13 g instant yeast
- 20 g sunflower seeds
Recipe-Instruction
- Mix wholegrain spelt flour and white spelt flour with rye meal and salt with a spoon.250 g (2 cups) wholegrain spelt flour250 g (1 cups) rye meal10 g (1,5 tsp) salt250 g (2 cups) white spelt flour
- Add the first part of buttermilk and sugar beet kraut and mix well.375 ml (1,5 cups) buttermilk75 g (¼ cups) sugar beet kraut
- Leave the mixture to swell for 4 hours. Start 240 minutes timer here
- Add the remaining warm buttermilk and sugar beet kraut to the mixture with the yeast and knead for approx. 10 minutes. Start 10 minutes timer here125 ml (½ cups) buttermilk75 g (¼ cups) sugar beet kraut13 g (4 tsp) instant yeast
- Then leave to rest in a warm place for approx. 1 hour. Start 60 minutes timer here
- Pour the dough into a greased loaf tin and add some sunflower seeds to the bottom of the tin.20 g (2 tbsp) sunflower seeds
- Place the bread in a cold oven and bake for 3 hours at
150 °C. Start 180 minutes timer here - Now reduce the temperature to
100 °C nd bake for a further 30 minutes. Start 30 minutes timer here - Turn the bread out onto a wire rack and leave to cool.
Nutrition
We like to bake the bread again and again and are always trying out new variations of flour. We spray the baking tin with baking spray and then like to put a few sunflower seeds in the tin and on the dough. This little trick is guaranteed to get the bread out of the tin easily and give you a delicious seeded base.
Try the bread yourself or let us know whether you prefer to bake the version with or without light-coloured flour.
