Name: Irresistible Honey Whole Wheat Bread
Prep time: 5 min
Cook time: 3 h
Total time: 3 h 5 min
Yield: 1 Loaf
Cuisine: American
Ingredients: 1 cup warm water; 2 tbsp butter, cubed; 1 tsp Himalayan salt; 2 tbsp honey; 1 1/2 cups unbleached flour *see notes above; 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour; 2 tsp bread machine yeast

An easy whole wheat bread machine recipe that has the rich flavour of whole wheat, the delicate sweetness of honey, and the soft fluffiness of white sandwich bread. This irresistible homemade honey whole wheat bread is simply the best.

As I stood in my kitchen on Sunday night, trying vigorously to warm my frozen fingers, panic set in. I couldn’t find any in the cupboard and an exhaustive search of the deep freeze turned up nothing.

I’d forgotten.

The top crust of a loaf of honey whole wheat bread. The golden crust is kind of swirled and you can see flecks of the wheat germ.

You see, I’d decided a long time ago that I’d rather sacrifice some of my evening time than doom myself to a morning of chaos.

A few minutes each school night are spent making my kids lunches. They aren’t magazine worthy, they aren’t gourmet, and they certainly aren’t exciting, but they are made with love.

And expensive produce! WOO rural Canada!

A honey dipper resting atop a slice of honey whole wheat bread. The crust is a golden brown and the honey has pooled on the hole filled surface of the bread.

I have this ~~weird~~ quirky idea of what I think my kids lunches should look like. There’s no hard and fast rule that I follow, but the structure is always the same:

2 kinds of fruit
2 kinds of vegetables
1 dairy
1 protein
1 main
And a healthy-ish treat

This recipe has kept them quite healthy for a number of years, while their friends dropped to the flus and colds that grip the school seemingly every week.

My kids bypass those germs easily, or get a very mild version of whatever plague is hip, happening, and infectious at any given time.

A slice of honey whole wheat bread laying in front of the loaf it was cut from. The crust is golden brown and the crumb is flecked with wheat germ and air pockets.

So here’s the problem: that night, I realized I forgot to buy bread.

Normally that’s not a big deal.

Tonight it was.

My son Zen requested his favourite : cucumber and cheese sandwich. He would not be swayed, he’s stubborn like his father.

You know, maybe he got some of that stubbornness from his mother too. I was determined to give him that sammy, because he’s cute, and I love him.

Zen loves this recipe. During testing and tweaking, he told me it was the best bread I’ve made. I’m taking that one to the bank.

This whole wheat bread recipe is dedicated to Zenen and cucumber sandwiches!

This Whole Wheat Bread Recipe is ready in 5 easy steps:

Add ingredients to the loaf pan in order listed.
Pop it in the bread maker.
Choose the correct setting.
Drink coffee and wait.
Fight your family for the first slice.

A brown honey dripper is dripping straw coloured honey with a loaf of bread in the background.

A NOTE ON FLOUR:

CANADIAN flour is different than American flour. Canadian flour is legally bound to have at least 13% protein content and this can cause discrepancies between my recipes and your results if you are using American flour, which doesn’t have a protein requirement.

Canadian flour is the first and still the greatest Canadian success story. Canadian wheat makes the finest flour in the world, bar none. Despite everything that is said about bread vs cake vs pastry flour, somehow magically Canadian all-purpose flour basically handles all those tasks effortlessly. Canadian home cooks and home bakers, in general, don’t really experiment with different types of flour — if you say flour in Canada, it means all-purpose, end of story. Here apparently is the breakdown of Canadian all-purpose flour: 73.0% carbohydrates; 13.0% protein; 14.0% moisture (including 1.0% fats.)
https://www.cooksinfo.com/flour#ixzz2Ty9igK8t

Now that we know the differences between flour nationalities, I recommend anyone using American made flour to use Bread flour – I linked to two flours that passed the protein test in the recipe card – or any flour with 12-13% protein.

HOW TO MEASURE PROTEIN CONTENT IN YOUR FLOUR

The easiest way is to look at the nutrition label and do some quick math!

Grams of Protein / Grams per Serving = _________ X 100 = ______%

nutrition information chart on the side of a bag of flour.

In this image, the protein percentage of the flour is: 4/30=.1333 = 13.3%

HERES WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THIS WHOLE WHEAT HONEY BREAD RECIPE:

USE local honey. Supporting your local economy is good, but the best reason for buying local honey is that the flavour and freshness can’t be beat.
THIS bread recipe mixes whole wheat and all purpose unbleached flour – I found it gives a perfect mix between fluffy white bread and the flavour and heartiness of a whole wheat bread.
1.5 LBS – this recipe is for a 1.5lb loaf of bread. Please ensure your machine has the capacity to handle a 1.5lb loaf!
MY family LOVES when I bake this whole wheat bread, and they all show up like little bloodhounds sniffing the air as the bake cycle comes to an end.

A loaf of golden brown bread with swirled looking crust.

If you love homemade bread, you should check out my other awesome bread recipes:

Best Bread Machine Recipe

Let’s connect: Follow me on Pinterest <3

1 Loaf