Rye Bread

My husband and I both love rye bread.  When we go to a deli with good rye bread, we usually order our sandwiches on rye.  Whenever I brought a loaf home, it would disappear pretty fast.  Rye bread was my son's first table food.  I think you understand, we love rye bread.  I noticed that deli breads were really starting to get expensive.  The only way I was buying rye was by the half loaf, and we usually ended up eating it within a day or two of me bringing it home.  Once I learned how to make edible and somewhat pretty loaves of white and wheat bread, I decided that it was time to learn about rye bread. It is definitely not the hands-off, throw everything into the bowl at once bread that I'm used to making.  I spent an evening looking at recipes on the King Arthur Flour website.  Some of the recipes looked good, others looked a little bit scary.  One had sauerkraut in it.  The recipe claimed that you couldn't taste the kraut.  The reviews begged to differ.  I crossed that recipe off the list without trying it!  I came across the recipe for sandwich rye bread.  Most of the ingredients looked relatively normal.  I knew that the mashed potato flakes would be fine because I used them in my whole wheat bread. The pickle juice seemed a little bit odd, but I went ahead with the recipe. The pickle juice helped enhance the flavor of the rye.  My husband didn't know it was in there until I told him.  Now we save our pickle jars so that we can make rye bread.  I wouldn't recommend trying this recipe without a mixer.  It takes quite a bit of work to develop the gluten with rye flour.  The Publix I go to only had light rye, so that is what I used.  Even though this recipe required more hands on time than other recipes, it was still a very easy recipe for me.  Just follow the directions and you will be fine.  It makes a great BLT, tuna sandwich, and grilled cheese!