The essence of no knead baking is that a wonderful loaf of bread can be baked without bothering to knead the dough. Just mix a few ingredients, wait several hours, mix again, wait a little bit more, then bake. At the end, there it is, your own bundle of baked goodness.
Here is the basic recipe. Master this formula first. Read other posts to discover tasty and simple variations.
Mix the following three dry ingredients in a large bowl (a bowl quite a bit larger than the ingredients).
1. 4 cups of flour (see more advanced recipes for flour combinations. For your first attempt start with all-purpose flour. If you absolutely want to pimp up your recipe, use 1 cup of other flour, like whole wheat flour, as one of the four cups)
2. 3/8 teaspoon of active dry yeast. The amount doesn't have to be scientifically accurate. Add about halfway between 1/4 and 1/2 teaspoon.
3. 2 teaspoons of salt (keep the salt and yeast apart until they are mixed in the flour.I read somewhere that direct contact with salt stops the yeast's action -- but maybe I'm wrong about that.)
Mix these three ingredients together so the mixture is uniform.
Add 2 cups of room temperature water--which you've boiled and cooled in advance.
Blend the water into the dry ingredients until you get a nice dough (maybe 3-4 minutes or so). Scrape the bottom of the bowl to make sure all the ingredients are blended. Experience has taught that complete blending is better. Unmixed lumps could haunt you.
Cover the bowl with a large plastic bag or a tight fitting lid. They tell me yeast in anaerobic, so it's fine with the yeast if the container is sealed tightly.
Let the container sit for 18 hours. OK, 16 hours might be good. Maybe 14. I've even read a recipe that sits for only 4 hours--but I have witnessed that four hours doesn't do it to my liking. Use 18 hours as your 'ideal' until you've done your own experimenting and come up with a different time of your preference. EXTRA: I recently started mixing the ingredients in the morning and baking at night. That means the dough rises about 8 hours or so before the next step. The results are fine.
The recommended place to keep the covered bowl is in an unlit oven, since the surrounding heat is uniform. Some people say keeping the oven light on raises things to an ideal temperature for yeast. That's a variation I haven't tried. If the temperature is moderate where you are, you might leave the container on a counter top, not in the oven.
The next step is called 'punching down' by bakers. I do not follow the Breadtopia video here (see other posts for my homage to Breadtopia as my model). Please read my variation:
At the end of the 18 (or so) hours, take off the plastic bag or pot lid. The dough should be a bit bubbly. Here's where it's important that you use a large bowl, much larger than needed just to contain the ingredients alone. Take a rubberized or silicon scraper and scrape part of the dough off the side of the bowl. Fold the scraped-off part into the rest of the dough. Keep folding and blending the dough until all parts of the dough-ball have been blended together.
In other words, disturb the dough and blend it together, but do not be rough. You just want to massage the dough and let it know you're the boss, sleep time is over, and it's a new day. The Breadtopia video shows the baker touching the dough with floured hands. The dough is usually pretty sticky. Personally, I don't like to touch it. I do all my mixing and disturbing the dough's rest with scrapers. I never touch the dough with bare hands. Not that I'm obsessive. I find touching the dough unnecessary.
The idea for this scraping method derives from my bread machine experience. The machine I used when I used a bread machine applied the same mixing action during the 'punching down' step that it applied in the initial mixing step. Mixing is mixing. I don't mix the dough as vigorously during my 'punching down' step as during my initial mixing, but in principle the bread machine taught me there doesn't necessarily have to be a difference.
Take the lid off your Dutch oven. After 2, 3, or 4 minutes of massaging the dough as described above, slip the dough ball into the Dutch oven. I use a cast iron Dutch oven. I wipe a pastry brush or cloth or paper towel with a teeny bit of olive oil or grape seed oil all around the Dutch oven before I put in the dough. I am absolutely sure baking purists are shocked by my suggestion of coating the Dutch oven with a thin film of oil. I have my reasons, so if someone wants to question this step, please add your comment.
I've never tried an enamel-coated Dutch oven, but it doesn't seem as if a small, thin coat of oil would hurt things.
OK, the dough is now in the base of the Dutch oven. It's up to you if you want to spread the dough around and reshape it. I don't. It will spread itself around on its own. In any case, cover the Dutch oven with a linen, nonfluffy towel. Let it sit 1 1/2 hours plus or minus bonus minutes you add or subtract after you experiment.
After it has fermented for 1 1/2 hours, cover the Dutch oven with its heavy lid.
The Breadtopia video says you should heat your oven for maybe a half hour before you put in the Dutch oven. The cheapskate in me has never allowed me to do that. When the time is up (18 hours plus 1 1/2 hour) I put the (room temperature) covered Dutch oven in the oven and turn on the heat for the first time.
For my black cast iron Dutch oven I use 450 degrees. The video suggests 500 degrees for a light- or white-colored enamel-surface Dutch oven.
The Breadtopia video says heat for 30 minutes for the first part of the baking. I did this the first few times. No longer. I now heat the Dutch oven with the lid closed at 450 degrees for 15 minutes. Maybe your oven is different or your Dutch oven is different or something else is different. Maybe you want a different combination of times and temperatures. That's up to you.
At the end of 15 minutes (or maybe you will use a different time) open the oven and take off the lid of the Dutch oven. Things will be HOT HOT HOT. BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL. Not only should you cover your fingers, also cover your wrist because heat comes out quickly from the Dutch oven when you take the lid off. It's not an explosion of heat, but you don't want to burn yourself.
Turn the oven down 50 degrees. Bake for maybe 15 minutes more (depends entirely on the color of the top that you like).
It's done.
Take the bread out of the oven and the Dutch oven. Cool it on a rack.
Enjoy.
This recipe is about as basic as I can make it. I do not do fancy tops. I do not do twisty bread. By your third or fourth bread you will go back to the internet and find more recipes to your liking and you will start to do fancier things. As I wrote elsewhere on this blog, this recipe is extremely forgiving, so even an amateur like me can make some pretty fancy and tasty stuff. Go for it.
Showing posts with label breadtopia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label breadtopia. Show all posts
Preliminary Kerfuffle
Bread baking has the reputation of being difficult. I've been cooking since I was able to see the stove top on my tippytoes. I can fix many exotic dishes using many different ingredients following many different national styles. At one time in the fog of my past I applied for one of the most prestigious food critic posts in the world. Nevertheless, it used to be a matter of pride that I never baked. Who needed it? Bread was the last thing I ever expected to concoct in my kitchen.
More out of boredom than anything else, two years ago I bought a bread making machine. My long-time guard was down and I wandered into neglected culinary territory.
The stuff the machine produced was passable. But I knew there was more to baking bread than pouring flour into a gadget and waiting for it to regurgitate a bread-like substance.
Then one day in my wanderings on the internet I stumbled upon Breadtopia's website. Here was an approachable method of taking bread making out of the machine and into my hands. I accepted the challenge. I read the instructions, viewed the videos and tried the recipe. I was hooked from my very first loaf. My world changed.
For over two years now I have been baking bread and similar goodies using the no knead method described by Breadtopia. Being the kind of guy I am, I am incapable of sitting still and following recipes more than the first time around. I have to change things, do things my own way, lift up the hood and rearrange the parts. As a result I have made a few minor discoveries that improve--I claim modestly--on the method Breadtopia started me on.
Which brings us to this website. This website is devoted to sharing those discoveries. Readers can try them and judge for themselves whether I have brought the art of bread baking one step further or plunged it further into a new dark ages.
I also have secondary goal. I am aware the economy is tough and many people have to pinch every penny. It makes sense to encourage easy home bread baking to anyone in pinched economic circumstances. Bread may not be the most expensive item on the menu, but home bread baking can save a surprising amount of money for any person or family that eats bread regularly.
Having made my missionary statement, let me describe the method to my madness.
As much as I owe an intellectual debt to Breadtopia, Mark Littman, the Sullivan Street Bakery and all the pioneers of no knead bread baking, I find all the recipes I've seen so far a little too fancy for home bread baking week in week out.
It's always a treat to try a new recipe. If the recipe works out well, everyone promises to do it again a second time. Whether or not you do it a second time depends not only on tastiness, but on ease of performance. If it's too complicated, well, maybe it won't get redone so soon.
Add to the equation the fact that we're talking about bread. Most Americans eat bread several times a week--if not every day. Home bread baking recipes have to be easy and straightforward enough to be done once or twice or more times a week if they are to become a regular part of the diet, as opposed to being one more of the long list of great recipes that never actually get repeated. And there has to be some variety. Eating the same thing every day is a drag.
My suggestion is for readers to take a look at Breadtopia's videos on the net--but don't memorize them. Breadtopia is a wonderful teacher. He is very clear and helpful. He is my baseline. I am sure he gets great results.
The problem I have with his method is that it more elaborate than necessary, in my book. I get the results I want with maybe 40% less effort than he demonstrates. I would not be insulted at all if people told me they prefer his methods to mine. But I'll stick to my shortcuts, thank you.
In the entries on this blog I will present a dizzying number of variations. I assume it is better to learn principles than memorize individual recipes. To get you started I present a baseline recipe. Beyond that entry, I describe variations. If you want to follow the baseline recipe week after week after week, be my guest. I assume, however, that you will want some variety. So I include hints about how the baseline recipe can be tweeked. If you change this or that from time to time you will more likely keep your enthusiasm and curiosity pumping. Bread is probably something you eat a lot, so having the keys to many variations on the theme will make your bread baking a skill you will want to practice well into the future.
I also have a sneaky heuristic (that is a fancy word for 'teaching) principle in mind. The heuristic principle is that you will adopt as your own the method the one or ones you discover among all the variations. Most people prefer the things they discover for themselves over the things they are taught and told to follow blindly. It does not hurt my ego at all if you make your bread differently than I make my bread. We can all get along.
I recently met a young lady in the flour aisle as I was shopping in a large supermarket. She asked if I bake. Of course, I said. She then said she never baked because she hates being exact and she was always told that bakers must measure everything exactly and follow recipes scrupulously. My reaction: Bullhockey!!! I do not measure exactly and at times I change things at whim (within a range). I assured the young lady that it's possible to bake a lot of things with as much invention and variation as most home cooks use when cooking other dishes.
The recipes I present in this blog are very forgiving. They tolerate a good degree of variation, both variation of quantity of each ingredient and variation of prep time. I present baseline recipes to get the reader over the first hump. But almost any single part of every recipe I present here can be adjusted -- and the results will be good. If you happen to like the same results each time you bake, pick one set of parameters and follow them each time. If you want change, there really are a lot of things that can change in each recipe. Once you understand the general principles, there are many variations waiting for you to try. Go for it.
More out of boredom than anything else, two years ago I bought a bread making machine. My long-time guard was down and I wandered into neglected culinary territory.
The stuff the machine produced was passable. But I knew there was more to baking bread than pouring flour into a gadget and waiting for it to regurgitate a bread-like substance.
Then one day in my wanderings on the internet I stumbled upon Breadtopia's website. Here was an approachable method of taking bread making out of the machine and into my hands. I accepted the challenge. I read the instructions, viewed the videos and tried the recipe. I was hooked from my very first loaf. My world changed.
For over two years now I have been baking bread and similar goodies using the no knead method described by Breadtopia. Being the kind of guy I am, I am incapable of sitting still and following recipes more than the first time around. I have to change things, do things my own way, lift up the hood and rearrange the parts. As a result I have made a few minor discoveries that improve--I claim modestly--on the method Breadtopia started me on.
Which brings us to this website. This website is devoted to sharing those discoveries. Readers can try them and judge for themselves whether I have brought the art of bread baking one step further or plunged it further into a new dark ages.
I also have secondary goal. I am aware the economy is tough and many people have to pinch every penny. It makes sense to encourage easy home bread baking to anyone in pinched economic circumstances. Bread may not be the most expensive item on the menu, but home bread baking can save a surprising amount of money for any person or family that eats bread regularly.
Having made my missionary statement, let me describe the method to my madness.
As much as I owe an intellectual debt to Breadtopia, Mark Littman, the Sullivan Street Bakery and all the pioneers of no knead bread baking, I find all the recipes I've seen so far a little too fancy for home bread baking week in week out.
It's always a treat to try a new recipe. If the recipe works out well, everyone promises to do it again a second time. Whether or not you do it a second time depends not only on tastiness, but on ease of performance. If it's too complicated, well, maybe it won't get redone so soon.
Add to the equation the fact that we're talking about bread. Most Americans eat bread several times a week--if not every day. Home bread baking recipes have to be easy and straightforward enough to be done once or twice or more times a week if they are to become a regular part of the diet, as opposed to being one more of the long list of great recipes that never actually get repeated. And there has to be some variety. Eating the same thing every day is a drag.
My suggestion is for readers to take a look at Breadtopia's videos on the net--but don't memorize them. Breadtopia is a wonderful teacher. He is very clear and helpful. He is my baseline. I am sure he gets great results.
The problem I have with his method is that it more elaborate than necessary, in my book. I get the results I want with maybe 40% less effort than he demonstrates. I would not be insulted at all if people told me they prefer his methods to mine. But I'll stick to my shortcuts, thank you.
In the entries on this blog I will present a dizzying number of variations. I assume it is better to learn principles than memorize individual recipes. To get you started I present a baseline recipe. Beyond that entry, I describe variations. If you want to follow the baseline recipe week after week after week, be my guest. I assume, however, that you will want some variety. So I include hints about how the baseline recipe can be tweeked. If you change this or that from time to time you will more likely keep your enthusiasm and curiosity pumping. Bread is probably something you eat a lot, so having the keys to many variations on the theme will make your bread baking a skill you will want to practice well into the future.
I also have a sneaky heuristic (that is a fancy word for 'teaching) principle in mind. The heuristic principle is that you will adopt as your own the method the one or ones you discover among all the variations. Most people prefer the things they discover for themselves over the things they are taught and told to follow blindly. It does not hurt my ego at all if you make your bread differently than I make my bread. We can all get along.
I recently met a young lady in the flour aisle as I was shopping in a large supermarket. She asked if I bake. Of course, I said. She then said she never baked because she hates being exact and she was always told that bakers must measure everything exactly and follow recipes scrupulously. My reaction: Bullhockey!!! I do not measure exactly and at times I change things at whim (within a range). I assured the young lady that it's possible to bake a lot of things with as much invention and variation as most home cooks use when cooking other dishes.
The recipes I present in this blog are very forgiving. They tolerate a good degree of variation, both variation of quantity of each ingredient and variation of prep time. I present baseline recipes to get the reader over the first hump. But almost any single part of every recipe I present here can be adjusted -- and the results will be good. If you happen to like the same results each time you bake, pick one set of parameters and follow them each time. If you want change, there really are a lot of things that can change in each recipe. Once you understand the general principles, there are many variations waiting for you to try. Go for it.
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