No Knead Artisan Bread

I tried a new recipe for artisan bread. The part that sold me was that it only uses a half teaspoon of yeast. I normally make the basic boule from my Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day book, and that takes 1.5 tablespoons of yeast -- that's 9 times as much! I had to read it twice to make sure I wasn't seeing things, but yes, 1/2 tsp is all it needs! Though this new bread requires very little effort, it had to be planned farther in advance. I had to put it off for 3 days before I could finally mix the dough because it needs ~12 hours to rise and it just wouldn't work with my schedule. You'd want to make it in the evening or later, and be home for a few hours in the morning to finish it off. You also want to plan a nice meal to go with it. It's not really a sandwich bread, but it goes fantastic with soups or stews. We ate it with just butter. My whole family loved it. My 2 year old was screaming for some the next morning. I asked if she wanted peanut butter toast or cereal or anything else instead, and she was very insistent (as most 2 year olds can be!) that it was the new bread with butter she wanted.

Because I'm slightly crazy, I also took a video of the bread hot out of the oven so you can hear it crackling. Read to the end for that.

 

The crust is absolutely perfect. It's crunchy on the outside, and airy yet chewy on the inside.

The recipe I followed was adapted from Jim Lahey’s My Bread. It was doubled to make a 2.5lb loaf. After the initial overnight rise, I split the dough in half. I shaped one loaf and re-covered the bowl with the remaining dough. After 1 hour, I shaped the second loaf and then baked the first loaf. When the first loaf was done baking, the second loaf was ready to go into the oven and the dutch oven was already hot. I actually found the 2 loaves to be too much for our family of 5. When I make it in the future, I will reduce it by half to make just one loaf. You can freeze this bread, but that would soften the crust.

Basic No-Knead Bread

6 cups bread (recommended) or all-purpose flour, plus more for work surface
1/2 teaspoon instant or active-dry yeast
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 2/3 cups cool water

In a large bowl, combine the flour, yeast, and salt. Add the water and stir until all the ingredients are well incorporated; the dough should be wet and sticky. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Let the dough rest 12-18 hours on the counter at room temperature. When surface of the risen dough has darkened slightly, smells yeasty, and is dotted with bubbles, it is ready.

Lightly flour your hands and a work surface. Place dough on work surface and sprinkle with more flour. Fold the dough over on itself once or twice and, using floured fingers, tuck the dough underneath to form a rough ball.

Generously dust a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with enough flour, cornmeal, or wheat bran to prevent the dough from sticking to the towel as it rises; place dough seam side down on the towel and dust with more flour, cornmeal, or wheat bran. Cover with the edges or a second cotton towel and let rise for about 2 hours, until it has doubled in size.

After about 1 1/2 hours, preheat oven to 425-450 degrees. Place a 6-8 quart heavy covered pot, such as a cast-iron Dutch oven, in the oven as it heats. When the dough has fully risen, carefully remove pot from oven. Remove top towel from dough and slide your hand under the bottom towel; flip the dough over into pot, seam side up. Shake pan once or twice if dough looks unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes.

Cover and bake for 40-50 minutes. Uncover and continue baking about 5-10 more minutes, until a deep chestnut brown. The internal temp of the bread should be around 200 degrees. You can check this with a meat thermometer, if desired.

Remove the bread from the pot and let it cool completely on a wire rack before slicing.

This is the dough the next morning after rising.

After shaping.

Fresh bread!