Tuesday, December 05, 2006
first bread results
edit: check out m.bittman's follow-up article on nyt about the no-knead bread.
AGH! i forgot to write about how the bread turned out! i won't post all the bread pictures in this blog, but pictures of the process are in my breaking bread post.
i think the bread came out extremely well. when it was sitting on the cooling rack, i was thinking it looked like we had just come back from some fancy bakery in paris and brought home a freshly baked boule! i mean, look at it! doesn't it look awesome?
the best part of the bread is the crust that formed all over, while the inside remained moist (maybe a little too moist?) and soft. we didn't have the same problems as i've read others had, and really, even a monkey could have made it (though, monkeys are quite sophisticated - i've seen them ice skating, smoking cigarettes, caring for children...the list goes on. so i suppose i should say instead, 'even pippi and crosby could have made it, if they had opposable thumbs').
anyway, it tasted really fresh and the fact that amateur bread makers like myself and cavin could make something like this is proof that anyone reading this can make fancy artisan bread!
we've been using it for sandwiches for lunch, so we're almost done our first no-knead loaf-child. so last night, we picked up more flour, and decided to make two more loaves.
when we were at the store though, we picked up a different brand of all purpose flour: king arthur. so last night we were in experiment mode, because we still had 3 cups of the gold medal brand APF. will the fancier, high quality flour produce a higher quality loaf? we will soon find out - the two loaves are currently sitting in the kitchen about 11 hours into the resting period.
i realized that i never really explained what we did for the bread, though, we pretty much did what the recipe in the article says, but i'll write it out here anyway:
AGH! i forgot to write about how the bread turned out! i won't post all the bread pictures in this blog, but pictures of the process are in my breaking bread post.i think the bread came out extremely well. when it was sitting on the cooling rack, i was thinking it looked like we had just come back from some fancy bakery in paris and brought home a freshly baked boule! i mean, look at it! doesn't it look awesome?
the best part of the bread is the crust that formed all over, while the inside remained moist (maybe a little too moist?) and soft. we didn't have the same problems as i've read others had, and really, even a monkey could have made it (though, monkeys are quite sophisticated - i've seen them ice skating, smoking cigarettes, caring for children...the list goes on. so i suppose i should say instead, 'even pippi and crosby could have made it, if they had opposable thumbs').
anyway, it tasted really fresh and the fact that amateur bread makers like myself and cavin could make something like this is proof that anyone reading this can make fancy artisan bread!
we've been using it for sandwiches for lunch, so we're almost done our first no-knead loaf-child. so last night, we picked up more flour, and decided to make two more loaves.
when we were at the store though, we picked up a different brand of all purpose flour: king arthur. so last night we were in experiment mode, because we still had 3 cups of the gold medal brand APF. will the fancier, high quality flour produce a higher quality loaf? we will soon find out - the two loaves are currently sitting in the kitchen about 11 hours into the resting period.
i realized that i never really explained what we did for the bread, though, we pretty much did what the recipe in the article says, but i'll write it out here anyway:
no-knead bread
1. mix 1/4 tsp yeast with 1 1/2 to 1 5/8 cups warm water (100F-110F degrees) in large bowl
2. gradually mix in 3 cups AP flour until combined, and 1 1/4 tsp. salt
3. cover with plastic wrap for 12-18 hours (the longer the better)
4. generously flour the surface you will be working on, and add the dough (and more flour if the mixture is too wet), fold it over itself a few times, and cover loosely with plastic wrap for 15 minutes
5. create a ball with the dough by bringing the sides down underneath itself, so all the seams are at the bottom. generously flour a cotton dish cloth (not terrycloth!) and put the dough ball, seam side down on one side of the cotton cloth, and cover with the other side of the cloth for 2 hours
6. about 1.5 hours into the 2 hour proof, turn the oven to 450F. put the vessel (with the tight fitting lid) you will be cooking the bread in, into the oven to heat up - we used our 3.5 qt. le cruset.
7. after the 2 hour proof is up and the vessel & lid are really hot, put the dough, seam side up, into the vessel, cover, and put back in the oven.
8. bake for 30 min with the lid, and then remove the lid for the remaining 30 minutes
9. remove bread from vessel, put on cooling rack and let cool before eating
cavin left a few comments about the process, again, in the comments of the breaking bread post. i encourage you to read these for yeast information and for pictures of our bread at each of the steps.
i mentioned above that i thought the bread might be almost "too moist". if you are able to watch the video of m.bittman (and the other dude whose name escapes me right now) from the nytimes article you can see that his dough at the 2 hour proof step is a lot more cohesive than our globby mess (see our pictures, again, on the breaking bread post) so this time around, cavin and i added less water than he originally had the first time. (hmmm, i was going to post the link, but i see that since the article first published on november 8, it is now in the nytimes archive, and you might not be able to access it anymore, nor the video.)
to be honest, the first loaf was made by cavin, so i don't know exactly the moisture content of the bread compared to what we have now in the kitchen, but i think it's less. i think that because we use a small amount of yeast, there is no risk or overresting the dough when it sits for 18+ hours. i think resting has something to do with the dough deflating if overrested, thus resulting in a flat loaf. also, because the dough is rather moist, when you put it in the hot vessel and cover it, this creates a steaming effect, which is what makes the bread really crusty.
after tonight, we will know whether or not it is worth spending the extra money for the king arthur flour (it might have more gluten in it, so it would create a different texture? i have no clue, actually. i feel like i'm making stuff up now). right. so once we know which flour is best, i want to experiment with adding herbs, cheese, nuts, sesame seeds, etc. to the mix (when should we add it?) to get flavored bread.
i just thought of something else though. our oven can only hold 1 le cruset at a time, and we made the two doughs roughly at the same time, so one of the breads will be resting or proofing for at least an hour more than the other, thus we really can't do serious statistical analyses on the bread. aie. i guess we'll just have to deal with it and take that into account when we are critiquing our next bread victims.
i mentioned above that i thought the bread might be almost "too moist". if you are able to watch the video of m.bittman (and the other dude whose name escapes me right now) from the nytimes article you can see that his dough at the 2 hour proof step is a lot more cohesive than our globby mess (see our pictures, again, on the breaking bread post) so this time around, cavin and i added less water than he originally had the first time. (hmmm, i was going to post the link, but i see that since the article first published on november 8, it is now in the nytimes archive, and you might not be able to access it anymore, nor the video.)
to be honest, the first loaf was made by cavin, so i don't know exactly the moisture content of the bread compared to what we have now in the kitchen, but i think it's less. i think that because we use a small amount of yeast, there is no risk or overresting the dough when it sits for 18+ hours. i think resting has something to do with the dough deflating if overrested, thus resulting in a flat loaf. also, because the dough is rather moist, when you put it in the hot vessel and cover it, this creates a steaming effect, which is what makes the bread really crusty.
after tonight, we will know whether or not it is worth spending the extra money for the king arthur flour (it might have more gluten in it, so it would create a different texture? i have no clue, actually. i feel like i'm making stuff up now). right. so once we know which flour is best, i want to experiment with adding herbs, cheese, nuts, sesame seeds, etc. to the mix (when should we add it?) to get flavored bread.
i just thought of something else though. our oven can only hold 1 le cruset at a time, and we made the two doughs roughly at the same time, so one of the breads will be resting or proofing for at least an hour more than the other, thus we really can't do serious statistical analyses on the bread. aie. i guess we'll just have to deal with it and take that into account when we are critiquing our next bread victims.
Labels: cooking, vegetarian
2 Comments:
Anyway, the video is still available here.