Elf Bread

Because my son wants homemade bread so often, and it's a pain to make, this month I bought a cheap bread machine from amazon. I love it! All you have to do is dump in flour, liquid, and yeast in the bin, then push a button. A few hours later, voila. Homemade bread. It's definitely better than cleaning the counter from the dried flour shards that develop after kneading.

But... can bread be eaten on a low carb diet? I'm happy to say, yes.

I call this bread "Elf Bread" after Tolkien's elves who make lembas, a magical bread they use for travel in which one bite equals a meal.(Merry went overboard with eating it, but being a hobbit didn't seem to suffer too much). Seriously, with a glass of milk I eat one slice of this bread with butter in the morning, and another slice with butter for lunch, and I'm good to go till dinner.

I adapted this recipe from Dana Carpender's 500 Low-Carb Recipes: 500 Recipes from Snacks to Dessert That the Whole Family Will Love. This bread is so good you can serve it to your non-low-carb family for dinner, and they'll never guess it's low-carb (at least until they see you eating it also).

1/2 cup rolled oats
4 tablespoons raw wheat germ
4 tablespoons flaxseeds
4/3 cups boiling water
6 tablespoons blackstrap molasses
6 tablespoons Xylitol (or Splenda if you must)
2 tablespoons oil
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup ground almonds
1 1/2 cups vital wheat gluten
1/2 cup vanilla-flavored whey protein powder
4 tablespoons water
2 packages yeast

Put the rolled oats, wheat germ, and flaxseeds in the bread machine case or in a bowl (if making by hand). Pour the boiling water over them and let soak for at least 15 minutes.

Add the remaining ingredients. If using a bread machine put ingredients in the bin in the above order, then push the button. If making by hand proof the yeast with the oat-mixture, then mix in the liquid ingredients and sweetener. Stir in the dry ingredients and knead. Put in a greased bowl, cover with a wet cloth, and let rise until doubled (I like to let dough rise in the unheated oven where it isn't drafty). Punch down the dough and let it rise again. Place in a greased bread pan and bake at 350F.

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I have become a low-carb pod person. I cannot stop raving about this; I feel so much better, and with recipes like this don't feel in the least deprived. With no hunger and no sense of deprivation or food cravings I've lost 15 pounds since October and continuing. Time to buy new pants.