White Sandwich Bread (Amaranth)

I just bought some Amaranth grain.  It is such a healthful grain, that I could not pass it up!!  Read about it yourself, it is really worth using!  You can read about it here, last paragraph here, and here.  As an added bonus it will also lighten up the colors of my recipes, as it is a pale colored seed.

I am soo excited about this bread!!  I can honestly say this tastes like any wheat bread out there!! and my husband, you know, the one who refuses to eat any gluten free anything, AGREES!! He believes it tastes like the Nature's Own Honey Loaf.  It is very delicious, has many nutrient dense flours in it, compared to my other bread recipes it has a very short list of ingredients, and it produces a tasteful white bread that does not dissemble into a mass of crumbs with minor mistreatment.  This bread is for sure MY NEW FAVORITE and my kids' too!!  It is also actually made like traditional breads with a near hour rise that doubles in size!! So many things to be excited for with this bread!!  Soo worth trying too!! 

If you have problems with Bakers Yeast, you can try using  2/3 cups starter and reducing the Sorghum to 2 1/2 TBSP  and only 2/3 cup milk. While I am an avid vegetable puree user, I do not recommend them for this recipe.  Pumpkin, Butternut squash, and  Acorn squashes have flavors that are too strong for the subtleties of this recipe.  I will be trying sweet potato in this recipe to see if it is a possibility. 

I think the only other thing I might try is increasing the Amaranth content to 1/2 cup and reducing the rice flour to 1/2 cup.  Even despite having so much tapioca and rice in it, which are essentially poor bearers of nutrients, the nutrients are made up between the Amaranth and Flax.  It has 1/4 cup flax which is equivalent to the nutrients in 1 loaf of whole wheat bread (or nearly 3 cups whole wheat) and Amaranth.  Nutritionists recommend to the Gluten eating community to substitute 25% of the flour in their wheat bread with Amaranth to complete the nutrition.  It only makes sense to me that if we have the 1/4 cup flax equivalent to a loaf of wheat bread and we use Amaranth for 25% of our flours in this bread, then it will also complete our nutrition regardless of the other starches used.  Since Amaranth is so new to me, I am working my way up in its use, which is why I mentioned I wanted to try increasing the Amaranth to 1/2 cup above.  

Here is an excellent source that tells about grains and their nutrition. Specifically my two Favorite Amaranth and Flax! "As nutritious as wheat is, you can see that Amaranth puts it to shame..." read about it here  just scroll down to each of them.  Keep in mind that if Amaranth is not cooked your body will not be able to absorb its nutrients, so using it in bread is a very good option.

White Sandwich Bread (Amaranth)

3/4 cup White Rice Flour

3/4 cups Tapioca Flour

1/2 cup Sorghum
1/4 cup Ground Amaranth*

1/4 cup Flax (ground in a spice/coffee grinder)
1/4 cup Vanilla Pudding (Jello Brand Sugar & Fat Free is GFCF)
3 tsp Baking Powder
1 1/2 tsp Baking Soda

2 tsp Xanthan Gum (NOT Guar Gum)
1 1/4 tsp Gelatin

1 tsp Salt

1/4 cup Sugar or Agave Nectar

* * * *

2 Eggs, room temp and beaten

3 TBSP melted butter
1 tsp Vanilla

* * * *

1 1/4 cup warm rice milk or water

2 tsp yeast

1 TBSP Sugar

1) Mix all the ingredients in the first list in a large bowl.

2) Mix all the ingredients in list two in a medium bowl.

3) Mix ingredients in list three in a cereal bowl and set aside until thickened, then add them to the other wet ingredients.  Make a hole in the middle of the dry ingredients bowl and pour the wet ingredients in the hole.  Mix just enough to make everything wet and then pour into a single greased 4x9 inch bread pan (the clear glass bread pans are what I use) and smooth the top.

4) Turn the oven on for a few minutes to make it warm; be careful to not make it too hot or it will cook instead of rise.  You should still be able to touch the glass of the oven door without burning yourself.

5) Without removing the bread pan from the oven, turn the oven on to 350 and bake for 18 minutes. Then cover with foil and bake for an additional 20-25 minutes.  Remove from oven, take out of pan, and return bread loaf back to the oven without the pan or foil for 5 minutes longer.

*If you bought Amaranth that is not yet ground and need to use a spice/coffee grinder, then  you will probably need to toast/pop the Amaranth before grinding.  This also adds flavor to the  breads you will use it in too. Place the correctly measured amount in a small pot on the stove over high heat.  Constantly stir the seeds.  When the seeds begin to pop, turn the heat down to med-lo heat and continue stirring til the grain is a dark golden color and most of the popping as subsided.  Remove from the heat and let cool in a plastic bowl.  Finally grind the toasted seeds with your coffee/spice grinder.  I tried to just grind the seeds in the grinder without toasting and they would not grind.  I finally broke down and ground myself a whole bucket of seed, because this recipe was definitely worth it.