One of the recipes he raved about was bread that is easy and spectacular. It has flour, a lot of water, salt, and a bit of yeast. You mix (without kneading) the ingredients together and let it rise for 18 hours. Then you form it into a ball, let it rise again, then cook it in a Dutch oven that you've had in the oven while you've preheated it to 450°.
The result is supposed to be a loaf that "is incredible, a fine-bakery quality, European-style boule."
I gave it a try. I wasn't convinced. The dough, batter almost, was probably too wet. It kind of soaked into the towel it was sitting on for the second rising and didn't dump into the hot casserole. I guess it deflated way too much on the way to the pot and ended up a flat, tough loaf.
I was discouraged and never got around to trying it again.
A couple of weeks ago Duck Duck Gray Duck blogged the recipe. I got inspired to try it again.
I had better luck this time but I still think I need to adjust something. The loaf still ended up flatter than I hoped for. For the second rising you're supposed to form the dough into a ball. It was so soft there was no way that it would maintain a "ball" shape. It stayed flat.
But at least this time the dough didn't soak into the towel and easily went into the Dutch oven. The result was a flatish loaf that tastes very nice. And has a crisp crust.
Here's the batter dough after the first rising:
Dumped into the much-too-large Dutch oven (the recipe says to use a 6 to 8 quart Dutch oven, which I did...I'll try our 4 quart one next time):
The baked loaf:
The inside of the flat loaf:
I wonder what I should try next time. A little less water? A smaller Dutch oven? (Yes.) Well, those are about the only adjustments possible. Wish me luck.
The recipe came from The New York Times and the accompanying article tells you about the theory of the process.
I hope everyone out there will give it a try and will tell me what I can do to make it even better.
8 comments:
I must try it! But, can you believe, I don't have a heavy dutch oven? Might have to make a purchase first! I absolutely adore (especially for toast!) Trader Joe's Pain Rustique. Its ingredient list is nearly as simple, and I love the flattish rustic loaf. I will try this recipe this week and report back!
I had great results with this recipe when I first tried it (and blogged about it), but then many my subsequent attempts were similar to the results you described, so I stopped making it.
Recently, after reading Jim Lahey's recent book "My Bread" and checking out the Cook's Illustrated version of NKB (No-Knead-Bread), I've found two tweaks that really seem to help. First, using bread flour seems to make the dough hold its shape better and not get so wet and flat (I've been using 3/4 bread flour and 1/4 whole wheat).
Second, instead of letting it rise in a floured kitchen towel, I've been lining a large bowl with some parchment paper, placing the dough on the paper while it rises (bowl covered with plastic wrap) and then dropping the whole thing (paper and dough, not plastic) into the hot pot for baking. The finished loaf easily unsticks itself from the paper.
The Lahey book has some fun variations on this recipe...carrot, cheese, apple, etc. Hope this helps!
I seem to be missing something very important --THE RECIPE. I thought I scanned every thing you highlighted but missed the actual recipe. Help!
Mombert,
The link to the recipe is in the second to last sentence. here it is again.
Thanks! I don't know what if anything I have to bake it in, but maybe I'll think of something.
Thanks for the suggestions, Tom. Using parchment paper and bread flour should help a lot.
A comment from Julie, sent by email because the comment form was having problems:
Your bread looks fab from your picts. I do use bread flour (the higher protein helps make gluten), I do use parchment paper too for the 2nd rise, I use a 4 qt. cast iron dutch oven with lid, and a wet dough is good because it helps create a good crust-- when the wet dough hits the hot pan and steams...as Bittner describes in his article. Happy baking and cooking!
I used bread flour, everything was done according to the recipe. I think mine was not so batter like as it is drier here than CA. you can see my loaf at possOut.
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