Whole Wheat Bread Lab116 recipes

Whole Wheat Bread Lab

Whole Wheat Bread: what 116 recipes agree on

Honey wheat to 100% whole grain: whole wheat share, water, sweetener and fat per 100 g of flour.

116 recipes from 64 sites, each reduced to grams and written as baker's percentages: grams of each ingredient per 100 g of flour, so a small recipe and a double batch line up. Below: the typical loaf, how far recipes stray from it, and a page for every recipe with a link to the original.

Recipes

116

from 64 sites

Typical flour

450 g

about 3 2/3 cups

Oven

375°F

190°C · median of 98

Bake time

35 min

most 28 to 43 min

The typical loaf of whole wheat bread

The median of all 116 recipes for each ingredient, scaled to 450 g of flour. No single recipe is exactly this: each line is the middle of its own distribution. “Most recipes” means the middle half, from the 25th to the 75th percentile.

Typical whole wheat bread recipe in grams, with the range most recipes use
IngredientGrams
FlourThe scale for everything else450 gabout 3 2/3 cups
Whole wheat shareMost recipes use 225 to 450 g360 g
LiquidMost recipes use 285 to 360 g320 gabout 1 1/3 cups
Sweetener25% use none; the rest mostly 9 to 65 g15 gabout 1 tbsp
Fat32% use none; the rest mostly 22 to 44 g22 gabout 1 1/2 tbsp
SaltMost recipes use 7 to 9 g9 g
YeastMost recipes use 3 to 7 g6 g

Bake375°F (190°C) for about 35 minutes.

Volumes are approximate: flour at 125 g a cup, sugar 200 g, butter or oil 225 g, milk and other liquids 240 g.

Every recipe, ingredient by ingredient

Each dot is a recipe, placed by grams of the ingredient per 100 g of flour (100% would be as much as the flour). The shaded band is the middle half of recipes and the line is the median.

  1. Whole wheat share

    median 80% · most 50 to 100%

    Whole wheat flour as a share of all the flour. Bran cuts gluten strands, so a 100% whole wheat loaf is denser; many recipes mix in white flour.

    0%50%100%150%
    Each dot is up to 6 recipes.

    range 20 to 100%

  2. Liquid

    median 71% · most 63 to 80%

    Whole wheat flour absorbs more water than white, so these doughs run wetter.

    0%25%50%75%100%125%
    Each dot is up to 2 recipes.

    range 50 to 100%

  3. Sweetener

    median 3.4% · 25% use none

    Honey or molasses softens the bran's bitterness; honey wheat loaves sit at the top.

    0%10%20%30%
    Each dot is up to 5 recipes.

    range 0 to 25% · those that use some, mostly 2 to 14%

  4. Fat

    median 4.9% · 32% use none

    Butter or oil keeps a whole grain loaf from drying out.

    0%5%10%15%20%
    Each dot is up to 5 recipes.

    range 0 to 18% · those that use some, mostly 4.8 to 9.7%

  5. Salt

    median 1.9% · most 1.6 to 2%

    About 2% of the flour.

    0%1%2%3%4%
    Each dot is up to 4 recipes.

    range 0.8 to 3%

  6. Yeast

    median 1.3% · most 0.7 to 1.6%

    Whole grain doughs often use a little more yeast for the heavier flour.

    0%1%2%3%
    Each dot is up to 2 recipes.

    range 0 to 2.7% · 2% use none

Where recipes disagree

Measured by how far apart the 25th and 75th percentile recipes are. The widest gaps are where the choice of recipe matters most.

  • Fat. 32% of recipes use no fat, and the rest disagree too: the middle half of them add 4.8 to 9.7% of the flour weight.
  • Sweetener. 25% of recipes use no sweetener, and the rest disagree too: the middle half of them add 2 to 14% of the flour weight.

Recipes agree most on salt and liquid: salt 1.6 to 2%, liquid 63 to 80% for the middle half.

Around the world

109 of the recipes come in 5 languages with enough of each to compare: English 48, German 24, French 15, Portuguese 14, Italian 8.

  • German recipes use about half as much yeast as English ones (0.7% against 1.6% of the flour weight); most use no sweetener (54%, against 4% of English recipes) and no fat (75%, against 12%).
  • French recipes use under a third as much sweetener as English ones (0.8% against 13% of the flour weight); most use no fat (60%, against 12% of English recipes).
Every language, ingredient by ingredient →

The most-reviewed recipes

31 whole wheat bread recipes have 50 or more reader ratings. A rating count says how many people rated a page, which follows its traffic more than its quality. Against the other 85, medians per 100 g of flour, compared within each language:

On no ingredient do the most-reviewed recipes differ from the rest by more than chance would explain.

50+ ratings (31)the rest (85)middle half of all

  • Whole wheat sharethe most-reviewed recipes 100% vs the rest 70%

  • Liquidthe most-reviewed recipes 74% vs the rest 70%

  • Sweetenerthe most-reviewed recipes 3.5% vs the rest 2.5%

  • Fatthe most-reviewed recipes 5.4% vs the rest 4%

  • Saltthe most-reviewed recipes 1.9% vs the rest 1.9%

  • Yeastthe most-reviewed recipes 1.1% vs the rest 1.3%

Most reviewed

  1. Einfaches Vollkornbrot · gutekueche.at · German4.5 from 8,316 ratings
  2. Homemade Whole Wheat Bread Recipe · archanaskitchen.com4.9 from 3,270 ratings
  3. Volkorenbrood · 24kitchen.nl · Dutch3.0 from 1,847 ratings
  4. Whole Wheat Bread · sallysbakingaddiction.com4.9 from 1,617 ratings
  5. No-Knead Whole Wheat Bread · biggerbolderbaking.com4.7 from 638 ratings

Oven temperature and time

98 of 116 recipes state an oven temperature, and 44% of those bake at 350°F (175°C). The middle half bake at 350 to 425°F. The other 18 do not say.

  • 350°F44 recipes
  • 475°F16 recipes
  • 400°F15 recipes
  • 425°F9 recipes
  • 375°F8 recipes
  • 450°F5 recipes

108 recipes state a bake time. Taking the middle of any stated range (“55 to 65 minutes” counts as 60), the median is 35 minutes and the middle half bake 28 to 43 minutes.

Temperature and time together

The single most common pairing is 350°F for 30 to 40 minutes, with 21 of the 93 recipes that state both.

Rows: oven °F (°C in gray), every 25°F. Columns: minutes, 10 a column, from the start of each; the middle of a stated range counts. Darker: more recipes, up to 21 in one cell. Outlined: the median, 375°F for 34 minutes. 93 recipes state both. The edge rows and columns also hold the few recipes beyond them.

Recipes to start with

Closest to the typical loaf

Nearest the median on every ingredient at once.

Most whole wheat share

Least whole wheat share

All 116 whole wheat bread recipes →

Go deeper

Top sources

  • 11receiteria.com.br
  • 8tasteofhome.com
  • 6backenmitchristina.at
  • 5marcelpaa.com
  • 4bettybossi.ch
  • 4marmiton.org
  • 3chefsimon.com
  • 3foodnetwork.com
  • 3gutekueche.at
  • 3kingarthurbaking.com
  • 3misya.info
  • 3ptitchef.com

In 7 languages: English 48, German 24, French 15, Portuguese 14, Italian 8, Spanish 4, Dutch 3. Lines in other languages are read in their own units and words, and each recipe page links to the original. 64 sites in all. No site contributes more than 12 recipes.

How the numbers are made

Every ingredient line is converted to grams and grouped (butter and oil count as fat; white, brown and liquid sweeteners as sugar), then divided by the flour weight. That baker's percentage is the only comparison that holds across recipes of different sizes.

95% of the 950 ingredient lines got a weight. 46% of those weights were printed by the source; the rest were converted from cups and spoons with standard densities, so treat single recipes as close, not exact. Frosting, glaze, streusel and other toppings are listed on each recipe page but left out of the percentages.

A recipe outside the plausible range for any ingredient is left out rather than allowed to stretch every chart; it is usually a different dish with the same name or a misread line. Of the pages fetched, 238 were left out: 173 outside the plausible range on some ingredient (whole wheat share 80, liquid 51, yeast 17, salt 13, fat 8, sweetener 4), 33 with no flour, or none that could be weighed, 21 with a title that names a different dish, 6 duplicates of other pages, and 5 too many lines without an amount.

Every recipe page links to the original, which is where the method is. Recipe Lab does not republish instructions or photos.