Whole Wheat Revisited

My whole wheat recipe had been giving me some disappointing results. Part of that was due to my sluggish starter. I also think that the amount of water that I was using was a little skimpy. My old recipe was

Whole Wheat, Take 6
Prepare sponge.  When it is ready, put these ingredients in the bread machine with the white flour going in last.  Add the sponge on top.
Water	4 oz.
Whole wheat flour	2 ¼ cups
White flour	1  cup
Vital Gluten	none
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

My next attempt added 2 oz. more of water. I used the 4+4+4 starter refresh. That is take 4 oz. (all measurements by weight) of the old starter, add 4 oz. of white flour, and 4 oz. of water. I let that mature for 10-12 hours. I use the same formula to create the sponge, except that it uses 4 oz. of the newly refreshed starter. My sponge starts looking like this:

That was a 9PM. The next morning at 6AM the sponge has expanded nicely.

For my recipe, I've decided to measure my flour by weight for more consistent results. The recipe is now

Whole Wheat, Take 7
Prepare sponge.  When it is ready, put these ingredients in the bread machine with the white flour going in last.  Add the sponge on top.
Water	4 oz.
Whole wheat flour	10.5 oz.
White flour	5 oz.
Vital Gluten	none
Salt	1 tsp
Oil	2 Tbl
Honey	¼ cup

This mixture made a nice looking dough ball in the bread machine.

The completed loaf rose better than any whole wheat sourdough loaf to date. What can't be seen here is that the pompadour hair style that my rye loaves used to  exhibit has shown up in the whole wheat bread. I'll add some milk in place of some of the water next time.

As a bonus, it was delicious.