Ezekiel Bread Recipe (An Honest One)

I have baked Ezekiel bread more times than I care to admit, and I still don’t love it.

That is a strange way to open a recipe post. But I have read every Ezekiel bread recipe on the internet at this point, and every single one of them promises you’ll never buy store-bought again. I don’t think that’s true, and I don’t think you’re served by me pretending. To be fair, I have MCAS and the grains sometimes cause a reaction, so be aware.

Here is what is true: this bread is genuinely nutritious, it’s genuinely interesting, my family eats it happily, and it toasts beautifully. It is also dense, faintly sour, and an acquired taste. It is not a soft sandwich loaf and it never will be.

What follows is the recipe that actually works — because most of them don’t, including the one that used to live on this page. It takes about three hours, not three days. At the end I’ll tell you honestly who should bother.

What Is Ezekiel Bread?

Ezekiel bread takes its name from Ezekiel 4:9, where the prophet is instructed to make bread from wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and spelt. It was survival food — bread meant to sustain a man through a siege.

The nutritional accident of that combination is what makes it interesting three thousand years later. Grains are short on the amino acid lysine. Legumes have it. Put them together and you get a complete protein — all nine essential amino acids, in a slice of bread. That is unusual.

It is not gluten-free. It contains wheat, spelt, and barley. If you have celiac disease, this bread is not for you.

Ezekiel Bread Ingredients

Six things. That is the whole formula.

• Hard red wheat berries — structure and a nutty backbone. The gluten here is what holds the loaf up.
• Spelt berries — an ancient wheat relative. Milder, faintly sweet.
• Hulled barley — chew and fiber. Hulled, not pearl; pearl barley has had its bran polished off.
• Millet — small and mild, adds texture without taking over.
• Lentils — green or brown. The legume protein, and part of what makes the protein complete.
• Great northern beans — the sixth ingredient. See the warning below.

You’ll also need yeast, honey, olive oil, salt, and an egg. The egg is not traditional and it is not negotiable — a fresh-milled whole grain dough has weak gluten, and the egg is most of what holds the crumb together.

⚠️ A word about kidney beans. A number of popular Ezekiel bread recipes call for raw kidney beans. Please don’t. Raw kidney beans contain phytohaemagglutinin, and bread only reaches about 200°F in the center — nowhere near hot enough to destroy it. That takes a hard boil. Great northern and navy beans carry far less of it. Use those, or fold in beans you have already cooked.

Why I Don’t Sprout the Grains

Every Ezekiel bread recipe you will read insists on sprouting. Soak the grains a day, sprout them two more, grind the wet mass into a paste. It is what the old version of this page told you to do.

I have done it. My honest assessment: it isn’t worth it, and it is how most people end up with a brick.

Sprouted grains are saturated. Ground up, they are already a wet paste — and then the recipe tells you to add several more cups of water on top. That is not a dough. That is batter. It bakes into something dense and gummy in the middle, and no amount of flour rescues it. If you have made Ezekiel bread before and hated it, this is very likely why.

There is a practical problem too: two days of damp grain sitting at room temperature is two days of opportunity for mold, and wet grain will gum up a grain mill.

What you give up: sprouting does reduce phytic acid, which frees up some iron and zinc for absorption, and it raises a few vitamins. That is a real difference and I won’t pretend otherwise. But it is a modest one, and it comes at the cost of a bread that mostly does not work.

Mill the grain dry. Make an actual dough. You will get an actual loaf.

Is Ezekiel Bread Healthy?

Compared to bread made from refined flour, yes — and meaningfully so.

• Complete protein. The grain-and-legume combination supplies all nine essential amino acids. Most breads do not.
• Whole grain, bran and germ intact. Real fiber, not the added kind.
• Filling. The fiber and protein make a slice go much further than white bread.

It is also calorie-dense — roughly 175 to 200 calories a slice depending on how thick you cut it — so if you are watching intake, it is not a free food. And it is still bread. It will not undo anything.

How to Make Ezekiel Bread

Full measurements are in the recipe card below. These are the things worth understanding before you start.

Mill 2 cups of grain into 3 cups of flour — and measure the flour after

This is the mistake that ruins more loaves than any other. People mill three cups of grain, end up with four and a half cups of flour, and bake a dry brick. Two cups in, roughly three cups out. Measure after milling.

No grain mill? A high-speed blender works

Batches of no more than a cup, 60 to 90 seconds each, resting the motor between. Grind the beans and lentils first and separately — they are the hardest. Sift, and re-grind anything coarse.

The dough will be tacky, not smooth

It will never form the glossy elastic ball you have seen in white-bread videos. Tacky and cohesive is correct. Resist adding flour to chase a texture that is not coming — that is how you get a dry, crumbly loaf.

Bake to 205–210°F. Not 190°F.

I cannot overstate this one. A dense, freshly milled loaf reaches 190°F in the center long before its starches have actually set, so the thermometer tells you it is done when it isn’t. Use an instant-read thermometer, ignore the clock, and ignore the hollow-tap test entirely. Tent the top with foil once it is the color you want and keep baking — the crust finishes long before the middle does.

Cool it completely

Three to four hours, or overnight. A slice that is gummy at one hour can be a clean slice the next morning.

Ezekiel Bread Recipe

5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star

No reviews

Print Recipe

A dense, nutty whole-grain loaf made from the six grains and legumes named in Ezekiel 4:9. No sprouting — the grains are milled dry, which makes it far more reliable and takes about three hours instead of three days. Excellent toasted. Freezes beautifully.

• Total Time: About 3 hours, plus cooling
• Yield: 1 loaf (12 slices) 1x

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

FOR THE GRAIN MIX (mills into about 3 cups of flour)

• 3/4 cup hard red wheat berries
• 1/2 cup spelt berries
• 1/3 cup hulled barley (not pearl)
• 1/4 cup millet
• 3 tablespoons green or brown lentils
• 2 tablespoons great northern beans

FOR THE DOUGH

• 3 cups freshly milled Ezekiel flour (from the grains above — measure AFTER milling)
• 1 cup very warm water (105–110°F), plus up to 1 tablespoon more as needed
• 2 1/2 teaspoons instant yeast
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1 large egg, room temperature
• 1 1/4 teaspoons salt
• 1 tablespoon sunflower lecithin (optional)

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

Instructions

1. Combine the wheat berries, spelt, barley, millet, lentils, and beans, then mill them into flour. You should end up with about 3 cups. Measure the flour after milling, not before — this is the mistake that ruins more loaves than any other.
2. Stir the honey into the warm water. Sprinkle the yeast over the top and let stand 10 minutes, until foamy. If it doesn’t foam, the yeast is dead. Start over.
3. Add the olive oil, egg, salt, and lecithin if using. Whisk to combine.
4. Add the flour one cup at a time, mixing between additions.
5. Knead 8 to 10 minutes, by stand mixer on low or by hand. The dough should come together into a soft, tacky ball that pulls away from the bowl. It will not become smooth and glossy like white bread dough — tacky is correct. If it’s stiff or shaggy, add water a tablespoon at a time. If it’s soupy, add flour the same way.
6. Place in an oiled bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm spot 60 to 90 minutes, until roughly doubled.
7. Punch down, shape into a log, and place seam-side down in a greased 8.5×4.5-inch loaf pan.
8. Cover and let rise 30 to 45 minutes, until the dough crowns about an inch above the rim of the pan.
9. Bake at 350°F for 40 to 50 minutes, to an internal temperature of 205–210°F. Use an instant-read thermometer — do not rely on the clock or the hollow-tap test. If the top browns before the center is done, tent loosely with foil and keep baking.
10. Cool in the pan 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack. Cool completely — at least 3 to 4 hours, ideally overnight — before slicing.

Notes

Bake to temperature, not time. This is the single most important step. A dense, freshly milled loaf reaches 190°F in the center long before its starches have set, so a thermometer reading of 190 will tell you the bread is done when it isn’t. Take it to 205–210°F.

Cool it completely. A dense loaf keeps setting as it cools. A slice that’s gummy after an hour can be a clean slice the next morning. Do not cut it early.

Never use raw kidney beans. They contain phytohaemagglutinin, and bread only reaches about 200°F internally — not hot enough to destroy it, which takes a hard boil. Great northern and navy beans are far lower risk. If you want kidney or pinto beans for fidelity to Ezekiel 4:9, cook them first and fold them into the dough.

Hulled barley, not pearl. Pearl barley has had its bran polished off.

No grain mill? A high-speed blender works. Grind in batches of no more than 1 cup, 60 to 90 seconds each, resting the motor between batches. Do the beans and lentils first and separately — they’re the hardest. Sift and re-grind anything coarse.

Make the grain mix in bulk. Triple the grain quantities (about 6 cups whole grain), store airtight in a cool dark place, and mill 2 cups at a time as you need it. It keeps for months and makes about three loaves.

For two loaves: double everything and use two pans.

Storage: this bread molds in 2 to 3 days on the counter. Refrigerate wrapped tight for up to a week, or slice the whole loaf, separate the slices with parchment squares, and freeze up to 3 months. Toast straight from frozen — no thawing.

The dough is supposed to be tacky. Whole-grain dough never forms the smooth elastic ball you see in white-bread videos. Adding flour to chase that texture gives you a dry, crumbly loaf.

• Author: Lindsey Chastain
• Prep Time: 30 minutes
• Rising TIme: 2 hours
• Cook Time: 45 minutes
• Category: Bread
• Method: Baking
• Cuisine: American

Recipe Card powered by

Made this? Leave a star rating on the recipe card above and tell me how it went — especially your bake time and whether the crumb came out right. This bread has a lot of variables, and every data point helps the next person.

Why Is My Ezekiel Bread Gummy?

This is the question, and it has three answers.

• It is underbaked — even though the thermometer said 190°F. Freshly milled flour is enzymatically active: the amylase in just-ground grain keeps converting starch to sugar, which produces exactly that sticky crumb. Take it to 205–210°F.
• You cut it too soon. A dense loaf keeps setting as it cools. One hour is not enough. Give it three or four, or leave it overnight.
• There is too much water in the dough — almost always because the recipe told you to sprout, and then to add water to grain that was already soaked through.

How to Store Ezekiel Bread

It does not keep on the counter. The moisture and the whole grain mean it molds in two or three days, bread bag or not.

• Refrigerate — wrapped tight or in a beeswax wrap, up to a week. It firms up cold, so toast it.
• Freeze — and this is the right answer. Slice the whole loaf first, separate the slices with parchment squares, seal in a bag. Toast straight from frozen, no thawing. Three months, no quality loss.

Make two loaves and freeze one immediately. That is how this bread earns its place in a kitchen.

Variations

The base loaf is deliberately plain so the grain comes through. Once you have made it once:

• Seeds — sesame, sunflower, or flax, mixed in or pressed into the top before baking.
• Cinnamon raisin — one tablespoon of cinnamon and half a cup of raisins folded in before the first rise. This is the version my family asks for.
• Rosemary and sea salt pressed into the crust. Good alongside soup.

So Should You Make It?

Here is the honest answer I promised.

Make it if you want a genuinely nutritious bread, you like dense whole-grain loaves, you will actually eat it toasted, and you have some way to mill grain. It freezes brilliantly and it toasts better than almost anything.

Don’t bother if you are expecting a soft sandwich loaf, you want something your kids will eat without negotiation, or you are chasing a health miracle. It is good bread. It is not magic.

I don’t love it. My family does, which is why I keep making it. That is a perfectly respectable reason to have a recipe.

For more made-from-scratch bread, try our skillet cornbread with honey butter or flaky buttermilk biscuits. If you keep a starter going, our sourdough discard recipes will use up the rest.

Frequently Asked Questions About Ezekiel Bread