I've just begun with trying out the free form loaves, using the basic recipe from the book Healthy Breac Five Minutes A Day. I don't own the book, and found the recipe on a friends blog who makes it everyday. I made some yesterday, after I had refridgerated the dough for about 3 1/2 hours. It was my first time make a free form, and the first time scoring the tops too. I'm not sure exactly how to get a photo on here... but I have one of it. I didn't get one of the 'crumb' like I see everyone does, but still... I did get one. :)

What I'd like to know is if I can add things to the dough before baking, like to make it not so plain. Has anyone ever done that before with this recipe? I mean, I guess they have, as its just the basic. But how would one do that with a no knead bread like this? You would have to need like raisins and nuts and such into it wouldn't you?

thanks a bunch whomever can help me. :) much appreciated. shalom!

 -Ra'chel

The basic recipe seems really easy and the photos here on TFL so beautiful! I would love to try...

1) is it necessary to use a preheated Dutch oven or la Cloche? I have only one pyrex dish with cover, but I wonder whether it can be preheated to high temperature when empty? Do you have any experience with this or other materials? Do you use a parchment or do you oil the dish?

2) is it possible to bake the No-Knead recipe in a any loaf / cake pan without cover? Or just free-form?

3) have somebody tried to make No-Knead without preheating - either in a cold dish into preheated oven, or directly to a cold oven?

4) what about Jim Lahey´s book: my Bread? What other recipes except for the basic one does it include? Are there many variation? Isthe book worth buying? Are the recipes at least a little healthy?

Thank you very much for help!

zdenka

I am still struggling withno-knead bread. I am using the Cooks Illustrated receipe in which they used an enameled 6 1/2 quart enameled dutch oven (Le Crueset? sp.) preheated to 500 degrees. The bottom is somewhat burned; however, the temp of the center of the bread is only 190 - 200 degrees (Cooks Illustrated recommends a 210 degree center of bread temp. I have tried lowering the temperature of the preheat of the dutch oven to 450 degrees and I still get the same results. I have tested my oven temperatures with different thermometers and they all agree the temperature is accurate. My dutch oven is an aluminum 6 quart Wagner Ware Magnalite.

Should I try a heaver dutch oven? Is it possible that the smaller dutch oven is making the bread higher and therefore the center of the bread takes longer to get to 210 degrees? Any suggetions would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Terry

I tried making a no-knead loaf in a Romertopf clay baking pan today for the first time.  I sprinkled some cornmeal on the bottom of the pan and around the sides of the dough where I thought it might stick.

I plopped the dough into the pan, wet the inside of the cover, and put it all into a cold oven.  Baked for a while, then removed the lid to finish it.

The crust was nice and crisp, everything worked fine, BUT the loaf stuck to the bottom and sides, and I ruined it by prying to get it out.

How do you prevent sticking in this pan?  And how exactly are you soaking (or not) and preheating (or not) and baking?

(In the past I've used a heavy Dutch oven and sprinkled cornmeal, which worked great.)

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Alina

Find award-winning vegetarian and vegan recipes at my blog:

http://almostveganinparadise.wordpress.com

So I've made no-knead bread before and was a bit disappointed. But recently I got reinspired to try the Bittman/Lahey version as published in the NYT:

3 cups all-purpose or bread flour, more for dusting
1 5/8 cups water
1/4 teaspoon instant yeast
1 1/4 teaspoons salt

Mark Bittman was on "Good Food" on KCRW with Evan Kleiman a couple of weeks ago, talking about this recipe. What's interesting was that in his interview notes, he mentions the weights to use. However, someone please tell me how 1-5/8 cups water weighs 345g! :)

I measured these ingredients, and here's the comparison:

Flour: 428g (me), 430g (Bittman) (3 cups)
Water: 385g (me), 345g (Bitt.) (1-5/8 cups)
Table Salt: 8g (me), 8g (Bitt.) (1-1/4 tsp)
Instant Yeast: 1g (me), 1g (Bitt.) (1/4 tsp)

What's interesting about this, is that the water listed is close to 89% hydration! As a result, the dough is extremely wet and goopy, almost like a batter! Here are baker's percentages (using a nice dough calculator); I'm using ADY instead of IDY:

Flour (100%):     430.37 g  |  15.18 oz | 0.95 lbs
Water (89%):     383.03 g  |  13.51 oz | 0.84 lbs
ADY (.2%):     0.86 g | 0.03 oz | 0 lbs | 0.23 tsp | 0.08 tbsp
Salt (1.8%):     7.75 g | 0.27 oz | 0.02 lbs | 1.39 tsp | 0.46 tbsp
Total (191%):    822 g | 28.99 oz | 1.81 lbs | TF = N/A

My questions are:

1. 89% hydration can't be right, can it? Did I do something wrong here?
2. How much water do you use when you make this recipe?

I'm having trouble getting the rise I'd like in a few different no-knead sourdough recipes.  In fact, I'm not even sure how long to let the dough proof.  Some recipes call for an hour or two, others up to 4 to 6 hours.  I'm definitely not seeing my dough double.  Any ideas how I can remedy this?

Hi all!

I'm a semi-lousy cook on the best of days, so bread baking is truly pushing my personal skill level envelope...

I got started on this quest through Bittman's No-Knead bread and the NYT. It WORKED. It was just a bit bland, though...So, while searching the Web for No-Knead recipes, to see if I could add milk, or buttermilk, eggs, sugar, etc., I came across a recipe that was published in the "Bread Baker Bible," for Casserole Bread.

Casserole Bread was even easier than No-Knead. Mix the ingredients (Proof 2 pkg yeast in 1C milk, 3 Tbs. sugar, 1 1/2 Tbs. butter, scalded and cooled, add 4 1/2 C. flour mixed with 1 Tbs. salt) for 2 minutes, cover and let rise for 40-45 minutes until doubled, beat vigorously for 30 seconds, pour into a greased 1 1/2 qt. casserole, and bake 50-60 minutes at 375.

The recipe made too much dough, more to fit a 2 qt., but it was EASY. I got distracted, and think I added water twice, because again, the loaf was heavy and dense, but MUCH tastier than the basic No-Knead. It LOOKED really odd, though, because of not having a rise time and skin formation. The crust is very thin, and while the top looks pretty "bread like," the parts that are in contact with the pan have "bubble craters" on the surface...Tasty, though. Very, very tasty.

Have any of you ever tried this type of bread? If so, any tips or suggestions would be appreciated. I will be making this one again, at least a few times, to see if my results were consistent, and to see if reducing the water makes a better loaf. The crumb was beautiful, just somewhat "soggy" and squeezable. The kind of bread, you pull the middle out of and can squeeze and play with before you eat it...

Will update you with my progress.

~Kizzle

I have been working with the Cook's Magazine "Almost No Knead" recipe, which seems pretty slick to me. Trouble is, after baking the recipe a number of times, I feel there is an either/or issue resolving hydration vs rise and shape stability. I do my second rise on a parchment sheet lowered into a bowl (boule?) shaped like the rounded loaf I hope for. When the second rise is complete, I remove the parchment sling, slash the loaf, then lower it into the 6 quart dutch oven for baking. The loaf is about an inch less in diameter than the pot.

Now for the tragic outcome: The loaf subsides into something like a very thick Frisbee. It springs pretty well and the interior is uniformly holey. Tastes great. But.... I'd like a nice upstanding loaf that is a good deal rounder. I don't want a basketball, but should I reduce the hydration to make a stiffer dough? Is there just something inherent in the no knead regieme that makes a more slack dough? Anyone have strategies for "stiffening the spine" of my boules without giving up their nice moist chewiness?

Thanks for your ideas.

Hello all!

I made this recipe http://www.cookingbread.com/classes/class_no_knead_bread_ta.html this weekend and it turned out FANTASTIC!  This was my first no-knead bread in a dutch oven (just purchased it that day).  The look and taste was exactly what I expected.  I couldn't have had a better experience with it.

Tim

This is in response to Trailrunner's questions on a mixing discussion over at Hansjoakim's blog here on a fantastic-looking crumb he has on his Hazelnut bread.

Lately I seem to get best results with a combo of warm shorter bulk ferment with frequent early folding and long cold final proof. No mixer, no kneading with flour, no repeated French-folding. (warning, this could change as soon as I read of a better method, so please take with a grain of sea salt!):

• Hand mix all the ingredients with a large dough whisk in large bowl (incl. salt)
• Cover and let rest (autolyse) for 30 min. (I know you are supposed to leave out the salt but I find it easier to mix everything initially if not using a standmixer)
• After 30 min. rest, use plastic dough scraper to fold dough onto itself in the same bowl, just like what Mark does in his video here. I count to about 100 as that takes me just about 3 min., and that has seemed to develop the dough well.
• Next round up the dough with scaper and place it into a clean, lightly spray-oiled lidded dough bucket - or for large-size doughs where I double or triple the formula, I use a big square clear plastic food service container with lid.
• Let the dough sit for 30 min. (preferably at 76F location), then do a single stretch & fold as per Hamelman: if dough is in smaller bucket, tip the dough out onto a lightly spray-oiled counterstop, stretch it out into a rectangle, and letter fold it onto itself once, rotate 90 degrees, letter fold again, and put it back in the bucket for another 30 minutes. If dough is in big square container, just fold it right in the container and turn upside down when done.
• Repeat step above 2 more times for a total of 3 folding sessions spread 30 min. apart. Then leave the dough to finish bulk-fermenting at 76F, usually for another 90-120 minutes until just doubled (my home-made starter is not that fast a riser).
• Next shape loaves, then I place the shaped loaves in a 45-50F location (my unheated mudroom) to retard overnight or 12 hrs min.
• After cold retarding I place the proofed loaves in my room temp (65F) kitchen while I preheat my baking stone for 45 min. and bake with steam right after that, usually the loaves are proofed enough after all that time retarding, and the oven spring is great.

Here are results of a less slack dough (65% hydration pain au levain 10% whole wheat), not huge holes like you'd get with a very wet dough, but large enough and evenly distributed, and very flavorful crumb, chewy but not gummy:

I still need to try SteveB's double-mixing technique he describes here. If anyone sees any error in my ways with how I've been doing this, I'm all ears! I'm sure I'll revise this after I read Advanced Bread and Pastry, due in soon.