Monday, August 29, 2011

No Knead Artisan Bread

I remember a time when Artisan bread and No Knead bread was a huge thing in blogland, matter of fact you couldn’t visit a single blog without either a recipe being posted or some mention of the bread being made.

I will tell you right now that I’m not a baker and matter of fact I’m sure you’ve noticed that unlike most food blogs, mine has 90 % actual food and only a very few sweet/dessert recipes.

I do love to bake bread, I think there’s nothing like a slice of fresh bread out of the oven with some butter slathered on, it’s enough to make me weak at the knees.

I saved a bunch of these No Knead bread recipes but this is the one I turn to the most, mainly because it’s always turned out well no matter how many times I’ve made it and it’s well above 50 loaves of bread or so.

Recipe is from Steamy Kitchen who adapted it from Mark Bittman of NY Times who got it from Sullivan Street Bakery.

No Knead Bread

3 cups bread flour (I like Harvest King bread flour)
1/4 teaspoon instant yeast
1 teaspoon fine table salt (or 3/4 tablespoon of kosher salt)
1 1/2 cups warm water
Covered pot (five-quart or larger cast iron, something that can go into a 450F oven.)

1. Mix dough: The night before, combine all ingredients in a big bowl with a wooden spoon until the dough just comes together. It will be a shaggy, doughy mess.

Cover with plastic wrap and let sit 12-20 hours on countertop.

2. Shape & preheat: The dough will now be wet, sticky and bubbly. With a wet spatula, dump the dough on a floured surface. Fold ends of dough over a few times with the spatula and nudge it into a ball shape. You can use your hands if you like, just keep your hands wet so that the dough does not stick. Generously dust a cotton towel (not terrycloth) with flour.
Set dough seam side down on top of towel. Fold towel over the dough. Let it nap for 2 hours. When you’ve got about a half hour left, slip your covered pot into the oven and preheat to 450F.

3. Bake: Your dough should have doubled in size. Remove pot from oven.
Holding towel, turn over and dump wobbly dough into pot, using your hands to get the dough off the towel. Doesn’t matter which way it lands. Shake to even dough out. Cover. Bake 30 minutes. Uncover, bake another 15-20 minutes or until the crust is beautifully golden and middle of loaf is 210F.