5 Minute No Knead Artisan Bread

Hey all you bread lovers..especially lovers of that crusty artisan bread with the big holes...(the better to soak up olive oil or butter or both or whatever you put on your bread)...here is a quick simple easy recipe. I made 3 loaves this morning..effortlessly, and my overnight guests got a real treat-fresh hot homemade bread.

Also-now that we are all more thrifty...(I just could not pay $4.59 for 2 loaves of Brea bread at Costco when for much less, I could make a pretty good imitation at home)
Their are videos of this breadmaking process all over the Internet and I have posted my favorite one on the side...this is the address if you would rather cut and paste it into your browser: http://www.startribune.com/video/11967361.html


Here is the published recipe followed by my remarks.


Five-Minute Artisan Bread

From Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery that Revolutionizes Home Baking by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois (Thomas Dunne Books, 2007). Copyright 2007 by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois

Serves 4
Note: This recipe must be prepared in advance.
* 1-1/2 tablespoons granulated yeast (about 1-1/2 packets)
* 1-1/2 tablespoons kosher salt
* 6-1/2 cups unbleached flour, plus extra for dusting dough
* Cornmeal

In a large plastic resealable container, mix yeast and salt into 3 cups lukewarm (about 100 degrees) water. Using a large spoon, stir in flour, mixing until mixture is uniformly moist with no dry patches. Do not knead. Dough will be wet and loose enough to conform to shape of plastic container. Cover, but not with an airtight lid.

Let dough rise at room temperature, until dough begins to flatten on top or collapse, at least 2 hours and up to 5 hours.

(At this point, dough can be refrigerated up to 2 weeks; refrigerated dough is easier to work with than room-temperature dough, so the authors recommend that first-time bakers refrigerate dough overnight or at least 3 hours.)

When ready to bake, sprinkle cornmeal on a pizza peel. Place a broiler pan on bottom rack of oven. Place baking stone on middle rack and preheat oven to 450 degrees, preheating baking stone for at least 20 minutes.

Sprinkle a little flour on dough and on your hands. Pull dough up and, using a serrated knife, cut off a grapefruit-size piece (about 1 pound). Working for 30 to 60 seconds (and adding flour as needed to prevent dough from sticking to hands; most dusting flour will fall off, it's not intended to be incorporated into dough), turn dough in hands, gently stretching surface of dough, rotating ball a quarter-turn as you go, creating a rounded top and a bunched bottom.

Place shaped dough on prepared pizza peel and let rest, uncovered, for 40 minutes. Repeat with remaining dough or refrigerate it in lidded container. (Even one day's storage improves flavor and texture of bread.

Dough can also be frozen in 1-pound portions in airtight containers and defrosted overnight in refrigerator prior to baking day.) Dust dough with flour.
Using a serrated knife, slash top of dough in three parallel, 1/4-inch deep cuts (or in a tic-tac-toe pattern). Slide dough onto preheated baking stone. Pour 1 cup hot tap water into broiler pan and quickly close oven door to trap steam.

Bake until crust is well-browned and firm to the touch, about 30 minutes. Remove from oven to a wire rack and cool completely.


JOAN'S Comments:

#1. The first time I made this bread, I used my daughter's 45 dollar baking stone (from Pampered Chef) and half way through the baking of the bread it broke in 3 places! I have heard other stories of those stones breaking in the oven. That is why I chose to use my trusty iron skillets. (No wonder the guy in the video said.."It was a mistake to put the baking stone on the lowest rack.")I think a cookie sheet would be fine.

#2. I had to laugh really when all this came out last year-this guy thought he made the greatest discovery since, well.... sliced bread....I have been making bread since the 1960's...and I got this same result whenever I started to make bread and then...oops...I had to suddenly leave the house for an important event with my kids or spontaneously planned adventure by one of my college friends (before I was married). So then I put my unkneaded dough in the fridge..in fact, I didn't even get to put as much flour as I planned to in it. Then days later, I would pull out the dough and knowing I did not have time for the typical 2 risings (I could tell by the yeasty aroma of dough that it did not knead 2 risings) I would just form it into a loaf and let is rise a little bit on the counter and then baked it quick in a hot oven. It looked and tasted back then like the results of this "Revolutionary" new bread baking technique! Ha!

#3. You do not need a baking stone! (They break when accidentally dropped.) Bread turns out fine..unless you are a purist of some sort. Personally I would like to do a comparison test.

#4. Recipe calls for 1 1/2 Tablespoons salt..I use only 1 Tablespoon salt..the other way was too salty for me.

#5. I only used about 5 cups of flour...so first try that and if the dough seems too wet, add a small amount more of the flour. 6 cups made it way too dry. But that was me. I did not level off my cups of flour...just shook them.

#6. Besides the pan of water on the bottom rack, I opened the oven door occasionally throughout the baking and sprayed water into the oven with my big squirt bottle. This makes for a crispy crust.

#5 My pictures: each loaf was about a 14.5 oz in weight and about 8 1/2 inches long.
First I made 2 loaves, one in each of my 10 inch iron skillets. Then when I took those out and cooled them a bit, I put another round loaf on the cornmeal dusted skillet, slashed it like the video shows and let is rise a bit and then baked it.

This is going to make some terrific garlic bread!

Next time I will do 3 loaves at once on my big cookie sheet.