I've been invited to my niece's for Thanksgiving. I'll be travelling next Tuesday by Amtrak bus/train, 200 miles. I reminded her that I love to bake and what can I bring, and she cavalierly said nothing, we'd bake what we needed on Wednesday.

Well!!

So I decided not to bother with pies (which I have never made anyway) or cookies, but to stick with bread. Trouble is that I like 100% whole grain (fresh-ground), and she has two boys (about six and seven, I think) and a white-bread husband. So I'm looking for compromises.

I thought of white whole wheat, but I don't have any, my local natural foods store doesn't carry it, and I won't have the opportunity to go into town to get it there (if I could even find it there). What do you think I can make that they might like (going with the odds, that is)?

Marion Cunningham's Fannie Farmer Baking Book has a Brown-and-White Braided Bread that looks interesting. Each loaf has two brown braids and one white. The brown braids are colored with ww flour, molasses, and Postum (2t per loaf). I don't want to use Postum or coffee. I'd rather use cocoa.

She has another loaf, Raisin Nut, that is a flour blend and made like raisin bread but without the cinnamon.

Any suggestions would be appreciated. I plan to do the baking this weekend.

Rosalie

Ok... we tried our first yeast bread today.  I approximately halved the basic white bread recipe from the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook to make a single loaf instead of two, but used double the yeast, since what I had available had been sitting in the closet for at least a year, and probably longer.  We just dumped the yeast into the flour, and used room temp. milk.  The kids kneaded for about 30-45 minutes though, with different children kneading more or less well.  Periodically, I'd collect all the dough, mix it together, and redistribute, so the overall kneading balanced out.  Let rise once, punch down, let rise in a boule, and bake on a cookie sheet in the toaster oven.  I was really surprised at both how evenly the bread baked, and how moist it was.  The crust was really crisp and flakey, but inside it was super moist!  I hope the pic shows the crust and crumb ok... slicing warm bread with a steak knife is not my favorite technique!