No Muss, No Fuss, No Knead Bread

With the exception of the banana bread I made a few weeks ago, I've never made bread. I'm not quite sure why but I made up my mind to make some, and lets just say I got lucky for choosing this particular recipe. Its soooo good, I made it twice this weekend, and sooo easy that I got brave and changed it up a tiny bit on the second round. This is the kind of bread we get at our favorite steak house. It crackles when you squish it, and its soft and delicious on the inside. AND theres no precise timing or precise ANYthing involved. Trust me I don't really do precise.

I wont keep you waiting long... because you should go ahead and throw together (and I mean throw them together) the ingredients NOW so you can have some tomorrow!

This recipe is adapted from smittenkitchen.com (you're shocked I know), but this is exactly how I made it.

No Knead Bread
3 cups Bread Flour
1/3 tspn. Active Dry Yeast
1 1/4 tspn. Salt
1 1/2 cups tepid water (between 100 and 110 degrees) I don't have a thermometer so I just went with moderately warm but NOT hot water. I think with the extra long rise time, even if your water is a little cool it still works out.

1. Combine ingredients in a large bowl until all the water is absorbed and no dry flour remains, it will be pretty sticky.
2. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature for 12 to 18 hours (mine set at least 18 hours just because of our schedule), you'll know its done when the surface is bubbly.
3. Pour dough onto well floured surface and fold it on its self a couple of times. The dough is REALLY sticky and I probably used more flour than I needed and I was a little worried but it was great.
4. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest 15 more minutes.
5. Form dough into a ball and place on a well floured/cornmealed towel, dust more flour/cornmeal over the top and cover with another towel. Lots of reviewers on other sites had trouble turning it into a ball but it baked up fine. Mine was not too difficult to ball but it might have something to do with the massive amounts of flour I used in step 3!
6. Let rise 2 more hours. The original recipe says it will double in size again, mine did not but it turned out great anyway.

7. 30 mins before you are ready to bake your bread, place a large cast iron/enamel/pyrex dish into the oven and preheat the oven and dish to 450 degrees. It made a bigger loaf than I was expecting so keep that in mind when choosing a baking dish.
8. Carefully removed the preheated dish from the oven, gently place your hand under the bottom towel and flip the dough into the preheated dish. Cover (if you baking dish has a lid that's great, if not tin foil will work) and bake covered from 30 mins.
9. Remove lid and bake an additional 15 to 30 minutes. Mine was a pretty big loaf and it was perfect after 15 minutes uncovered.

ENJOY!
Okay so as I wrote out those instructions it sounded more complicated than it really was. I promise this is super easy, and so good its totally worth it. Its one of those super crackly artisan crusts and a super soft and delicious inside. YUM.

It makes a mean grilled turkey and cheese the next day too!
Ohh yeah, here's what I did the second go round. After the 15 minute rest I used a pastry scraper to cut it into one smaller loaf (about 1/3 to 1/5 of the dough) and six smaller dinner rolls before leaving it alone for the final 2 hour rise. I coated the dinner rolls with olive oil, and the crust turned out a little softer (but still crackly) than the unoiled loaf. I baked both the rolls and the small loaf together but cut the covered baking time down to 20 mins and followed up with the 15 minutes uncovered with perfect results.