First Attempt at No-Knead Bread
May 5, 2008
I have mentioned a few times that fresh bread is one of my favorite foods. This past summer I was in Greece for nine weeks on a couple archaeological projects, and for six of them we bought fresh bread at the bakery every day. Sure, we lived in tents, but the bread made up for any deficiencies.
I’ve been considering trying to make bread consistently – perhaps to the extent that I don’t need to buy any at the store at all. The two obstacles to this, of course, are time and money. No-knead bread then, is quite appealing to me for its low time requirement.
I found this recipe from a link on Mark Bittman’s blog at the NYTimes. Here is the original, adapted from the book Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. The best part about the recipe is that you make a batch for 2-8 loaves and can leave the dough in the refrigerator for up to two weeks according to the author. My attempt didn’t last quite that long, but I may not have covered it well enough.
I halved the recipe so it only makes two loaves. You’ll need 3 1/4 cups of unbleached, all-purpose flour, 2 1/4 tsp. of yeast (this is the amount that comes in one of those small packets), and 2 1/4 tsp. kosher salt. I used a rapid rise yeast when I tried it, which may have contributed to its downfall. Later this week I am going to try again with regular yeast.
In a large bowl, mix the packet of yeast with 1 1/2 cups of warm water (somewhere around 100 degrees Fahrenheit), then mix in the flour until everything is moist.
Cover your bowl with a towel or something else that isn’t airtight and let it rest for 2-5 hours. With my rapid rise yeast, I probably should have gone closer to two, but I accidentally left for work and it sat for five, which is why it collapsed I think.
At this point you can bake the whole thing as a big loaf, put it in the refrigerator, covered, for up to two weeks, or bake half of it for a small loaf. I wasn’t ready to bake it, so I put it away for a couple days.
When you are ready for your bread, sprinkle a little flower on it and cut off half of the dough (or use all of it if you want a big loaf). Turn it in your hands, letting the dough drag slightly on your counter-top. You want it to stick a little when you do this so it makes a smooth surface – I’ll have this illustrated when I try the recipe again. Finish forming it into a ball with the seams on the bottom. Because I don’t have a pizza peel, I just turned over a baking sheet and put a piece of parchment paper on top. Set your dough on the parchment paper and let it rest for 40 minutes.
Now, prepare the oven with a baking stone on the middle rack and some sort of pan that can hold water on the lowest rack. Turn on the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit.
After 40 minutes, when the dough is warmed up, slice the top of the dough a few times with a sharp knife and slide the dough (with parchment paper underneath) onto the hot baking stone. Take a cup of hot water and pour it into your pan on the bottom rack of the oven and shut the door quickly. The steam helps create a crunchy crust.
Bake it for about 30 minutes, or until the temperature inside is in the vicinity of 200-210 degrees Fahrenheit.
Unfortunately I don’t have a picture of my finished loaf, but it turned out small and dense because the dough was allowed to rise too much at the beginning and collapsed. It did taste good though. The remaining half of my dough didn’t last two weeks in the refrigerator. It dried up and was not usable.
I am going to hold off on my tips and preferences and the printable recipe until I try this again and get it right, but feel free to give it a shot. It still tasted good and probably would have been fine if I just didn’t let it rise too long. If you try it, let me know how it turns out. There is also a variation for using a bread pan if you don’t have a baking stone, which I’ll try with one of the two loaves later this week. Also, I’ll post a cost breakdown later and how it compares to store-bough bread.
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May 5th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
I totally admire you for attempting bread. it freaks me out a bit. ;P I will follow along with your adventures so maybe I can learn a bit more before attempting.
seriously, way to go!
May 5th, 2008 at 1:05 pm
I’m not sure if this is what caused your problem, but if you use rapid rise yeast, you don’t need to mix it with warm water. The warm water “activates” regular yeast. Rapid rise yeast is already activated and can just be added to the dry ingredients at the beginning.
Happy baking!
May 6th, 2008 at 8:50 am
Andy: I’m Jeff Hertzberg, one of the co-authors of “Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day.” Two tips I can give you. First, we never have the drying-out problem if the batch is covered well. In the fridge, I use Tupperware-like buckets, which I keep cracked for the first 24 hours; thereafter I close if fully and they don’t start inflating. That should take care of the drying-out problem.
But the small dense loaf… I’m not sure I can put that onto the Rapid-Rise yeast (which should work fine), or to the fact that you let it go for five hours in the initial rise. A longer rest after forming the loaf will probably help, try 1 hour and 20 minutes. Also, test your oven temp with a thermometer; that could be the likeliest culprit.
I may not be able to check back here, but please let us know how you make out by posting into any of the “Comments” fields in our blog at http://www.artisanbreadinfive.com
Jeff Hertzberg
May 6th, 2008 at 8:51 am
One other thing: are you baking at high altitude?
Jeff
May 6th, 2008 at 10:54 am
Melissa: Definitely give it a shot. Even though my loaf was a little messed up, it still tasted good.
Amy: Thanks for the tip about the yeast, I didn’t know that.
Jeff: Thanks for the great advice! I’ll try it with your suggestions and let you know how it goes.
May 6th, 2008 at 11:31 am
I keep hearing that this is a great recipe! I am gonna have to try it soon.
May 6th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
I’m on my 3rd attempt at no-knead bread. I’m not getting much rise, either. I’ve been using less yeast to make the initial rise slower, but I’m thinking that I am also letting the dough sit out in the warm room for too long. I think my dough looks wetter than yours, too.
May 6th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Unrelated to your topic, but since you’re a new cook, can you or your readers recommend a good basic cookbook for outdoor gas grilling?
May 8th, 2008 at 10:43 am
Family Nutritionist: I was surprised that my dough was pretty dry. Maybe my flour was condensed and so I put in more than the recipe called for. I don’t have an accurate scale for weight measurements. Let me know if you get yours to work well.
May 9th, 2008 at 9:32 am
I am not sure if this is why the growth problem with the bread but when looking at the bowl of your dough if looks dryer then it should be, but hard to tell by looking at the pic. Here is a link to the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day website with a pic of what the dough should look like http://www.artisanbreadinfive.com/?p=121
May 9th, 2008 at 9:45 am
You might try looking at this website the forum on this book as the topic really helped me – http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=111794&st=270 – for all purpose flour in the United States you want 75-76% hydration for this recipe so I used the formula there on this forum – which the author also responds to on this forum – and my next batch greatly improved so I figured for a batch calling for 6 1/2 cups flour = 2 lbs flour = 908 g flour. So you take that 908g x .76 = 690 g water
May 15th, 2008 at 7:34 am
hope someone can help. just finished baking first time loaf. let it cook 30 min with covered dutch oven then 15 mins without cover and its good but the crust is way too hard. i am senior citizen and my teeth not in great condition and i was afraid i’d break one of the few remaining teeth i have.
what can i do to ensure a less crusty top???
thank you
>^..^<
November 1st, 2008 at 8:46 am
[...] First Attempt at No-Knead Bread – I’m still working on perfecting my no-knead bread, and am getting pretty close to something I like (although it is actually based around Lahey’s recipe, not the one in this post). Also, my cost analysis of no-knead bread (and the cost can be reduced significantly with a jar of yeast and Lahey’s recipe). [...]
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