Day 21: Home Roman Meal Bread

So this bread is actually based off of a real bread you can buy in the store called Roman Meal Bread. It uses a grain cereal, developed by the same company, called Roman Meal. According to the packaging, this cereal consisted of whole wheat, rye, bran, flaxseed and came out a lot like oatmeal. It's called Roman Meal because it was apparently fed to the Roman legions. This creates a few problems: you can't buy Roman Meal bread around here, and you can't get just Roman Meal cereal either. I've looked on their website and amazon and they are currently unavailable. I was surprised that it is still around though. The recipe even says that it is found in stores in the Western United States and you can mail the Roman Meal Company to get a price and order some. This stuff is old school. I wonder if this recipe is even in the updated 30th anniversary edition of this book.

That being said, I still wanted to make it, so I found the next best thing: Bob's Red Mill 10 Grain Cereal. It sounded a lot like Roman Meal; it has wheat, rye, bran, and flaxseed, with a few extra things such as oats, barley, and millet. I made a bowl of it before I put it in the recipe and it was the blandest thing I've ever tasted. If Roman Meal tasted anything like this stuff then I'm not surprised at all that Caesar was killed. The recipe also calls for some extra wheat germ (another recipe uses it!) although there seems to be enough grain action going into this loaf. 

This bread turned out so much better than I thought it would! The outside texture is a little rough, but that happens when you have 10000 grains mixed in you. It's a solid chewy loaf with good texture while also being really soft. The flavor is fairly bland, but that just means it'll make a killer sandwich bread for people craving some whole grain goodness. If I ever find a box of Roman Meal or some way to buy it, I'll definitely make this bread again and compare the results!