Bread!
Last week I made the long-rise bread, after great trouble finding something to cook it in, which last night I realised was totally not a problem because I have something myself (in fact, the same thing I borrowed! but it’s in the pile of “kitchen stuff my grandmother insisted I take” which is, by and large, not useful stuff), so, ok, stupid, but whatever, now I can make the bread again.
Which I am going to, because that bread is good. It’s quite baguette-like, except in shape, which is fine, since I know how to make baguettes too, though I never do, because I can just go buy them. It’s got a great crust, and a really nice crumb. The only bad part about this bread is the amount of time you need to think ahead.
The directions sound much worse than they are. What you really need to do is:
Combine 3 cups of flour, ¼ teaspoon instant yeast (I used regular yeast and just proofed it first), 1¼ teaspoons salt with 1 5/8 cups water. Mix until it looks well mixed. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, let it sit for 18 hours. Active time: a few minutes.
When the dough has bubbles on the surface, sprinkle some flour on a surface, put the dough on it, put more flour on top of the dough, fold it into a ball, cover with the plastic wrap again, wait 15 minutes. Active time: one minute.
Make the dough into a ball. Cover with enough flour to be sure it doesn’t stick to anything (less than you’d think), put on a piece of towel, fold towel over, let sit for 2 hours or until doubled (mine didn’t double, quite, but it got in a little car accident). Active time: one minute.
Half an hour before you want to bake it, heat the oven to 450, and put some heavy pot (ideally with lid, though you can always use tinfoil instead — dutch oven, roasting pan, whatever) in to heat up with it. When oven is hot, take out pot, drop dough into pot, put back in oven with lid for 30 minutes. Take lid off, cook a further 15-30 minutes. Active time: a few minutes.
Clean up the flour you managed to get all over the kitchen. Active time: depends how much flour.
I’m making it again tonight/tomorrow.
NB: That’s the new-homed cat. She was really into carbs.
November 21st, 2006 at 10:17 am
Many thanks for trying the recipe, and for clarifying it, and for both the post and the picture. As soon as I get to the other side of Thanksgiving I’m going to follow your good example, and I thank you for making it so much easier.
November 21st, 2006 at 11:05 am
I tried the bread, after you linked to it. I made it twice, because the first one turned out pretty wet - didn’t rise quite enough, and the inside was, well, damper than good bread should be. Still edible, but not what I wanted. The second time I reduced the water (actually, used some by-weight proportions someone posted: 500g flour, 362g water) and it turned out much better! I used a deep corningware dish to bake it in - the only problem is that it turns out somewhat square.
November 21st, 2006 at 12:27 pm
The truth is that I sort of fudged the water and flour until it looked right, but it was very very close to the numbers there. There may well be weather issues — it’s colder here, and dryer now.
I just dumped it in a roasting pan, which gave it the nice shape — it was fairly solid and didn’t melt all over the inside of the pot.
I do not understand why the directions were written like they were. They’re not useful for people who make bread, if everyone thought the bread sounded ridiculously complex. They’re not useful to people who don’t make bread, because they frighten people off, and because the information given is too sketchy for people to fill in without some practice.
November 21st, 2006 at 5:20 pm
It looks delicious!! (this coming from a person who would be content to live the rest of her life eating only bread and cheese). I only wish I had the patience and the ability to bake bread. Fortunately for me, I live across the street from an awesome bakery.