Sourdough Honey Whole Wheat Bread

I made this using something that was originally Amish friendship bread starter that I had somehow misread the directions for on time to feed etc. I had reduced the amount of sugar by half in the starter and it still seemed to do fine. Anyway, I was fairly certain that this wouldn't work out, being the wrong kind of starter, but I am more interested in "real" bread than sweet friendship bread, so that is what I wanted to make. I made the recipe as written (but subbed olive oil and reduced the honey since I had a sweeter starter) and, to my great joy and amazement, it rose beautifully for one thing, and turned out like real, honest bread. It was great as toast and we devoured large amounts of it with a tuscan white bean soup. No, it didn't have the sourdough flavor (I'll probably have to just go the sourdough route one day), but it was like the expensive, more robust "European" breads from the grocery store. I can't say I would recommend such brash experimentation because I think it could have gone horribly wrong (everyone always says that other kinds of cooking are far more amenable to flagrant tinkering, but baking is more like chemistry so you'd better play by the rules), but I'll definitely be making this again. Oh, and I also used 50/50 flour because that's what I keep around. Thanks for a great recipe!

I don't know where the 4 servings comes from. This makes 1 well rounded loaf of bread. It has a nice texture and slices well. The honey flavor comes through very nice. I used melted butter instead of the shortening and round off the starter to 1 full cup. Definately a keeper.

Produced a perfectly sculpted boule. I can't see anything else this recipe needs except to serve with a side of...something.

This is a wonderful, tasty bread that can be done in the bread machine. I substituted the shortening with olive oil also. It turns out great! Makes a large loaf in my machine, close to 2 lb. Thanks Marg!

My husband really likes this bread for his sandwiches, but it doesn't taste much like sourdough (due, I'm sure, more to my starter than to the recipe). I replace the shortening with oil and proof it in my bread machine on the dough cycle--works great. It makes one 1.5 lb loaf for me.