Thank you very much for clear explanation. Now I know that this is
normal and won't need to go through any experimentation.
The only thing that I might try is add some more liquid.
On Sat, 03 Jan 2004 11:56:37 -0600, wesley >
wrote:

>On Sat, 03 Jan 2004 11:25:42 -0500, Nathan Gutman wrote:
>
>> I made bread from stone ground whole wheat flour using the following
>> recipe in a 1 pound Panasonic bread machine: 1 1/4 c water
>> 2 c flour
>> 2 tbs honey
>> 1 tsp light brown sugar
>> 1 tsp sugar
>> 1 tsp salt
>> 2 1/2 tsp dry yeast
>> 3 tbs wheat gluten
>>
>> The bread rose only to about half the size of a regular bread flour bread.
>> It is edible and tasted good but a bit dense and heavy. I used the whole
>> wheat cycle.
>>
>> Is this normal?
>> What should I change to get it to rise more? Thanks for any help.
>> Nathan
>
>Yes, it is normal. 100% whole wheat bread will never rise as much as white
>flour or mixed white/whole grain loaves. Basically the bran present in the
>whole grain interfers with gluten development. (Minor side note - many
>people confuse a high protein flour with high gluten. Not the same. Gluten
>is formed by the hydration and kneading action to form the protein
>molecules into long gluten chains. If you lack proper hydration, complete
>kneading or have something like bran in the dough that interfers with
>gluten development, you won't get a high rising dough even with a high
>protein flour.)
>
>Some people add extra vital gluten to their dough to help (though
>apparently that didn't satisfy your objective.) Others use a mix of
>white/whole grain flours - a 50:50 mix still gives a very good rise but
>give a good whole-grain taste. Or you can just accept that a 100% whole
>grain bread is just going to be different than a white bread.
>