Spent Grain Beer Bread

Let's say you've just made some beer and don't know what to do with the grain you used. Makes good chicken feed, but you don't have chickens. Makes decent granola, but you aren't into granola. You know what everyone likes? Bread. Good, whole grain bread, with a crispy crust and a good solid crumb to spread a cheese or make a sandwich on. And it's easy.

Don't make beer? No problem. Dry oats make a good version of this, as well.

Making a sponge
The key to doing this right is to make a solid yeast starter, just like with a high-gravity beer. Start with your water in a bowl, and add the yeast--bread, beer, wine, whatever strain you have lying around will work. Let it wake up, get a little creamy, and stir it in. Add your grains and slowly start folding in your flour. It's not a dry dough ball, so if it looks a little wet, no worries. Wet a (clean, obviously) dish towel, cover the bowl, and let it sit overnight.
 * 1 cup of grain, wet
 * 3/4 cup water, warm (90ish degrees F)
 * 1 1/2 cups regular flour
 * 1/2 tsp dry yeast

The goal here is to let the yeast get used to eating flour and grains and multiply into a strong, vigorous population. Strong yeast makes strong bread. Overnight is fine, longer is fine, too, just not more than 36 hours.

Dough

 * 1 prepared bread sponge
 * 2 tbsp honey
 * 1 cup water
 * 4 cups flour
 * 2 tsp salt

Uncover that sponge and get a good look and smell. Sort of boozy stale flour smell? Awesome. Toss on your honey and water, and get that mess into a liquid. Start folding in your flour a bit at a time until a rough dough ball forms, then turn it out of the bowl onto a floured surface. Flour up your hands, too, because it's kneading time. Give it about ten minutes, working the dough all the way out and kneading back in, folding like Hatori Hanso. Add flour if it gets too sticky. After it's good and kneaded, add your salt and knead another couple-few minutes, then transfer to a big greased bowl. Cover with plastic wrap.

If you have the day off, leave that bowl out on the counter with a towel over it and check it every couple of hours for a double rise. If you need to wait until tomorrow, toss it in the fridge. It won't mind. Either way, once the ball's doubled in size, you're ready.

Turn it out onto a floured surface and cut it into three or four (depends on your bread pans, really) smaller balls. Flatten those out, then start making hollow cylinders of dough to put in some greased bread pans. Cover with plastic wrap again and wait for a second rise (anywhere from 45 minutes to 3 hours).

Preheat the oven to 450, and toss a metal pan or cast iron skillet in there on the bottom rack to heat up. Seriously. Give it a while to really get hot. When you're ready to bake your loaves, slash them on top (I go with three diagonal slashes), throw a few cups of hot water in the heated pan, and bake for 15 minutes, turn (and butter if you want really crusty), and bake another 10 minutes.

Boom. Warm, tasty bread. Nice and fluffy, but filling and hearty. Makes a good sandwich, awesome French Toast, and is really good with soft cheese.