Fridge clean-up: Maple blueberry whole-wheat braid

We will be relocating soon to California and moving out of this apartment that has been our home for six years. When you have lived for too long in a place, things pile up. My freezer has a huge stash of stuff that has to be used before we leave in a week or two. One such gem I found hidden in our freezer was some organic blueberries. I had to use them for this bread from the Bread Bible. This way I also used up the maple syrup can that was lying around in the fridge.



I was apprehensive about making bread from the book because of some bad reviews. But Nic, of Baking Sheet tested out a Cinnamon swirl bread from this book and it looked great on her blog. I am, by no means, as good as her in terms of baking. But my confidence in the book was renewed and I made two huge braids last weekend. It is a half-day affair. But the taste of the end product was great.

The recipe I made was the one in the book and since the link has the bread machine version, the proportions for the dough are different.

Whole wheat sweet yeast dough for mixing by hand

1 cup warm milk
1/4 cup warm water
pinch sugar
pinch of ground ginger
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1/3 cup maple syrup
2 large eggs
Grated zest of 1 lemon
2 cups whole-wheat flour
2 1/2 to 3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 Tbsp instant yeast

Mix and knead as for a normal bread dough.


Make sure to have friends around for sharing because the bottom gets soggy if it lies around for more than two days. The bread is almost like a blueberry cobbler but with a lot of bread around. It is not too sweet even with so much maple syrup in it. It is great for breakfast.