A stunning yet nutritious treat well-suited for any banquet table. This star bread completes a hearty soup for a well-rounded dinner. Employing the same base formula and technique as with my whole wheat sandwich loaf, I have been able to achieve a luxurious enriched whole grain dough with less than 20% white flour… But if you’re feeling up to the challenge, go ahead and substitute more whole wheat for the bread flour. Don’t skip on the details. This recipe requires the 2 hour resting time and a food processor to coax a soft crumb from the whole grains. But DO experiment with fillings and flavors. Just be sure not to overfill and cut any additional fillings into small pieces. With a little restraint, however, you can use this basic recipe to create your own signature!

With whole wheat, oats, and a more than generous portion of fruit, these muffins will not be mistaken for blueberry cupcakes. But that doesn’t make them any less craveable! The sweetness, chewiness, and moisture retention properties of oats offset the coarse, bitter, and dry qualities that often plaque whole wheat goods. Then, for additional tenderness, brown sugar and buttermilk boost the acidity for an absolutely delightful “better for you” breakfast treat.

Splurge on good chocolate and cocoa, and these are absolute decadence. Enjoy with coffee in morning, tea in the afternoon, or a jammy red in the evening. So tasty, you’ll forget all about the whole grains.

The natural nuttiness of whole grains is a perfect complement to chocolate delights. But unfortunately, whole grain cookies tend to spread flat. I controlled for this issue by first chilling the dough; the cold fat spreads more slowly while the edges set and result in a thicker bake! And don’t be oppressed by mere “morsels”. Any shade chocolate bar studded with any sort of fixins’ are the beginnings of a uniquely you cookie concoction. Just chop up those bars into uneven bits for irregular bites of deliciousness. Even chocolate left over from your last ill-fated tempering project can be given a new purpose.

Having just a vegan cookie was not enough! My goal was to fully convert my whole grain breakfast cookies into a vegan delight that’s just as crave-worthy yet nutritious as its non-vegan counterpart. I started with my regular whole grain recipe and borrowed some tips from pastry wizard, Stella Parks. Incorporating her vegan substitutes, I started with coconut oil and whipped up an oat slurry for the eggs. Then, I observed her tip about adding dry malt extract. I tested with and without it, and unfortunately, this very obscure ingredient took an ok vegan cookie and elevated it to as-delicious-as-the-original. You see, the milk solids in butter and in milk get toasty in the oven and impart a je ne sais quoi note that is difficult to replicate. But the dry malt extract is one of the few ingredients I have discovered that offers that background butterscotchiness that would otherwise be missing.