What are ancient grains and why should we care? Check out this ancient grains bread recipe and this information on how to make truly healthy bread.

Eating healthy food that’s full of nutrition is an important wedge on the wellness wheel. An important part of your fitness journey. No matter where you are on your journey, you will be far healthier and live better if you have the proper nutrition to build your body. Ancient grains are one way you can enjoy better health.
For more ideas, check out these healthy lunches for weight loss.
Ancient grains bread
What is the purpose of going to all the trouble to find ancient grains? Our modern grain has been hybrid and altered so many times and ways that now it is harder for us to digest and assimilate nutrients. Changing the way God created food is a slippery slope. My wife, Christina is going to be writing today to talk to you about it.
An important thing to remember about modern wheat is that it’s full of glyphosates from all the spraying growers do. These chemicals are harmful to humans and animals and are used so much that they permeate most of our food supply. I feel like a lot of gluten intolerance is actually glyphosate contamination. I’ve seen a few studies on it, but we haven’t looked into it enough.
Whole grains are full of fiber and nutrients that are processed out of processed grains. They can be an important part of a healthy diet, lowering blood sugar and giving the heart-healthy nutrients it needs to stay strong. Most whole grains contain magnesium which many Americans are deficient in. Our diets are filled with processed foods that have nutrients processed out of and chemicals that leach out nutrients from the body.
There are two benefits to ancient grains. One, less contamination and finding organic grain is doable. And two, it’s grain the way God meant it, not changed into something else. So if you’re going to eat grain, cut back on wheat and gluten and eat a variety of grains instead, and go with the way your great-grandma grew up eating it. You can make amazing healthy homemade bread with ancient grains.

If you want more of my weight loss story and how I grew up on little Debbies and soda and learned how to change my health and life through exercise and nutrition, check out this nutrition guide. It has some basic dos and don’ts that my wife and I used for me to lose 120 pounds and be on no medication at age 53. There are also some sample meal plans in there. It was a long process, not a quick fix, but if I can do it, so can you!
There are so many health benefits of wheat berries and making your own flour with them. You can make einkorn flour, spelt flour, whole wheat flour, and more. You’ll get nutritional value, incredible flavor, and you can choose a grain that is better for your overall health if you have celiac disease or gluten sensitivity. Some ancient grains are gluten-free grains.
You can make nutritious bread, delicious salad, pizza crust, or any form of bread you like with the different types of flour you can make yourself. Many of them don’t have as much gluten as modern grains. They help you enjoy good health, unique flavors, and make healthy food. These grains are amazing. I love making my own healthy homemade bread! It has such a nutty flavor and meets our dietary needs.
What are ancient grains?
Studies have linked ancient grain consumption to health benefits, such as lower heart disease risk, better blood sugar control, and improved digestion. They have remained fairly unchanged for thousands of years. Many cultures base their diets on them and are far healthier than the American culture.
Here are 12 ancient grains that are healthy for your diet.
- Rye is a popular ancient grain that is a member of the wheat family. However, compared to wheat, rye contains fewer carbs and more vitamins and minerals. It’s full of fiber, but it’s not gluten-free.
- Einkorn, also known as farro piccolo, is the world’s most primitive form of available wheat.
- Amarnath is a nutritious, gluten-free grain. It’s full of protein, fiber, manganese, magnesium, and iron. It’s linked to decreased heart disease and inflammation. It can be used in place of rice.
- Millet is a well-known ingredient in birdseed, but it’s super nutritious offering manganese, magnesium, and thiamin for a healthy body. Millet can lower inflammation. It’s also gluten-free. It’s great as a hot breakfast cereal or a substitute for rice.
- Spelt is a descendant of Emmer, and is known in Italy as Farro Grande. Although spelt is an ancient grain, it is also the least ancient of the three farro grains.
- Kamut is a nutrient-dense grain with lots of health benefits. It has selenium, zinc, and niacin. It’s also good for lowering bad cholesterol. It does contain gluten. It has a nutty, chewy texture and is good in summer salads, soups, and casseroles.
- Sorghum offers Manganese, magnesium, copper, and selenium. It’s a great source of polyphenol plant compounds (antioxidants). It can be ground into flour. It has a very mild flavor so it’s versatile and it’s gluten-free.
- Tuff is the smallest grain. It has a lot of iron, magnesium, copper, phosphorus, and zinc, as well as vitamin C, an unusual nutrient for grains. It is gluten-free and can be used as a cereal or in soups and baked goods.
- Freekah is made from green durum wheat. It’s full of carotenoids as well as iron and protein. It’s good for preventing degenerative eye disorders. It’s similar in texture to brown rice. It does contain gluten.
- Farro is a popular grain containing niacin, zinc, and magnesium. It can lower the risk of heart disease and cancer. It’s very high in protein and fiber which help you feel full. It does contain gluten. Emmer is the ancient ancestor of modern wheat. It’s known as farro medio, or commonly as farro, in Italy.
- Barley contains selenium, iron, and thiamine. It’s high in soluble fiber especially beta-glucans. It contains gluten. It can be made into stuffing or used like rice. It’s easy to get and inexpensive.
- Quinoa is gluten-free and has many health benefits. It contains nutrients such as manganese, magnesium, phosphorus, folate, and zinc. It has antioxidants as well. It’s widely available. It’s easy to use as well, and cooks much quicker than other grains.
- Bulgar contains manganese, magnesium, and copper. It’s great in salads such as tabbouleh and makes a substitute for rice. It is sold parboiled, or partially cooked for faster cooking. It does have gluten.
- Fonio is a type of millet that’s widely consumed in West African countries. Fonio provides magnesium, copper, and zinc. It contains resistant starch, which passes through your digestive tract without being broken down and feeds your healthy gut bacteria. These bacteria break down resistant starch into short-chain fatty acids which lower blood sugar and inflammation, among other benefits. Fonio is not widely available in the United States but can be purchased online. It can be ground to make delicious gluten-free flour for baking or cooked for a fluffy, couscous-like texture.
- Heirloom varieties of other common grains such as black barley, red and black rice, and blue corn might also be considered ancient grains.
Where to buy ancient grains
Ancient grains can be purchased in a number of places. Most grocery stores will have some of the common ones. You can get many grains on Bulkfoods.com or even Amazon. Many ancient grains are only sold in their whole form and not as flour, so you may have to begin grinding your own grains to make flour if you want different kinds. Ancientgrains.com has a good variety as well.
Ancient grain flour
I do grind a lot of my own flour in my nutrimill grinder (that’s an affiliate link, I earn a commission if you order from it) because flour loses a lot of nutrients once it’s ground very quickly. Always store your whole grain flour in the freezer to preserve nutrients. Sunrise flour mill is one of my favorite places to get ancient grain flour. They grind it right before they ship your order out.
Don’t forget to give these ancient grain buns a try. You’ll love them as much as we do I just know it!
This bread makes the perfect base for Roasted Cherry Tomato Toast so try that out! You won’t be sorry.


Ancient Grains Bread Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 egg, room temperature
- enough water with egg to measure 1 cup, warm
- 2 T olive oil
- 3 T honey
- 2 tsp sea salt
- 3 C ancient grain flour of your choice
- 1 1/2 tsp quick rising yeast
Instructions
- Place the ingredients in the order listed in your bread machine and set to dough setting.
- Once dough is complete, remove from machine and place in a greased bread pan.
- Cover with a damp towel and let rise until double, about an hour, depending on the temperature of the room.
- If you want to make it by hand, mix egg, water, oil, and honey in a bowl, mix flour, salt, and yeast together and slowly add to dry ingredients incorporating as you go. Once all ingredients are mixed, knead for about 10 minutes. Then place in a greased bread pan and cover with a damp towel until doubles in size.
- Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes.
Notes
For more ancient grain recipes, check out ancient grain salads here. Including this Sundried tomato pesto farro salad.
For more bread recipes, check these out. Check here for some great beginner sourdough bread recipes too.
And check out this delicious elderberry jam to spread on your bread!
Hi. I had used your recipe to make a gluten free bread with the blend of I mixed before hand. It has, Amaranth flour, Sorghum flour, Teff Flour, Arrowroot flour, Tapioca Flour(starch) and xanthan gum. I made enough for 8 cups but I did use 3 cups of this blend to make the bread and followed the recipe. The bread didn’t rise double in size it only raised half way. It was covered with a damp towel and I even had plastic wrap over the pan then the towel over it. The oven was on to have a warmth in the kitchen. I let it sit for an 2 hours and it just didn’t double in size. It was half way up in the pan, I still went ahead and baked it. It is really dense and doesn’t taste good. What happened? Maybe more yeast 1/2 teaspoon should 1 teaspoon instead? Or have milk, more olive oil of 3 tablespoons instead of 2? Maybe change up the flour amounts or remove one for some other? I really want to make this bread and it didn’t come out right!
Hi Charmaine!
Thank you for trying our recipe and for reaching out. The gluten free grains are not going to rise as much as ones with gluten in them because that’s what makes the rise in bread. However, the recipe calls for 1 1/2 teaspoons of yeast, not just 1/2 teaspoon, so if you increase the amount of yeast it will help your bread rise more. You could also add an extra egg to help with some leavening. But remember it won’t be a light soft bread like one you would get with a gluten flour such as Einkorn wheat would produce. I hope you get a better loaf with some more yeast and eggs. Good luck! and Happy baking!
Hello there
I recently bought some ‘ancient grain’ flours and I tried this recipe with a blend of flours, including white flour and wholemeal flour. I also added seeds. It turned out really well and I’ll be trying it again with a different balance of the flours. I’d love a few more recipes for different breads with ancient grain flours if you have any!
Deborah
Thank you, Deborah. We are working on it. We have been using them for a number of years and have several recipes, but it takes a bit of time to produce everything needed for a blog post. But we have it in our future plans. Thank you so much for checking it out! We are so glad you liked it!
I make your recipe weekly using Spelt flour. It’s perfect! I’m going to try it with Rye flour now. Wish me luck!
Good luck, that’s awesome! So glad you enjoy it.
I make your recipe weekly using Spelt flour. It’s perfect! I’m going to try it with Rye flour now. Wish me luck!
This was so amazing!! I used organic white Spelt flour and added raw seeds to top. Yummy!!
So glad you liked it. Thank you for checking it out!
We are trying ancient grains for bread making at home for the 1st time. I like easy recipes with the fewest ingredients. This was perfect. My grandkids really enjoyed the bread, so I’ll be making this weekly for them. I used half hard red wheat and half soft white wheat that we grind ourself. My question: can you double this recipe and still get great results? Thx for sharing
Hi Marsha,
My wife does double it and it works fine for her. Thank you for trying the recipe. So glad you liked it!
This is my first attempt to make bread usung ancient grains. Since this recipe has honey in it, is the bread sweet?
Hi! Thanks for checking out the recipe. It’s not sweet like sweet bread or a muffin, but it’s slightly sweet as most bread contains a little bit of sugar. If that makes sense?
I made this bread and love how easy the recipe is. I don’t have a breadmaker at this time, so I did the 10-minute kneading. It wasn’t what I normally consider kneading though, having made traditional bread in the past. It was more like wet batter. I did pour the wet ingredients into the dry slowly and incorporated them each time. I then poured it into a smaller-sized bread pan (7.75 x 3.75 x 2.5) in the hopes of getting a loftier height. It did rise high, right into the towel, but then fell during baking. Overall, the height of the finished bread is about 2″. It also seems somewhat crumbly and a little grainy.
I’m only saying this to determine if I did everything properly or made mistakes. I’d love your feedback and appreciate you sharing your recipes with us.
When we make it, it’s not wet like that. It’s strange that it fell during baking, we’ve never encountered that. It could have something to do with the grain, maybe yours didn’t have as much gluten, but it does sound like there wasn’t enough of it if the batter was too wet. This is our regular recipe and the other comments we’ve received show that it worked for others, so I wonder what could have happened? Maybe you could try it again and it would work better. The crumbly part tells me there wasn’t enough gluten, but that could have been because the ratios were off. I hope it works better for you next time. Thank you for the feedback!
Thanks so much for your quick reply, Kent! I’ll give it another go with a new pan as well and let you know how I made out. I’d love to not be buying store-made gluten-free bread 😝, so I’m happy to try again. Much appreciated.
Gluten free is definitely a different texture and style of bread. It’s the gluten that gives the bread the bounce. So it’s usually flatter and crumbly without it. But so much better for your body! Enjoy!