Does anyone still do no-knead bread?

[rainey]

I am and will probably always be in awe of Jim Lahey and what he made manifest of the power and inevitability of yeast and bread. Despite the drama, I dabbled in no-knead bread 2 or 3 times until I reverted to conventional doughs made from pre-ferments in convenient time frames.

Still, I *never* make bread anymore -- by hand, stand mixer or bread machine -- without baking the dough in Lahey's hot, enclosed pot method. I also now use significantly wetter doughs. Those, to me, are the real enduring triumphs of his method and the things that have moved baking bread at home into a whole new category of excellence.

How about you guys? Still making bread? Still using no-knead or how have you moved on from it?

PS Isn't it great that it's cooling off and time for sweaters, Fall colors and dinners of hardy soups & crunchy crusted bread with cheese!

[todiane4]

I use it as a basic all the time, and it never fails. If I have too little time (need the bread to be done within the day), I add more yeast (a tablespoon-ish) and use warm water instead of room temperature--and then it rises faster, with minimal impact on flavor or texture. Sometimes, I get fancy and add herbs or raisins or olives or different flours on the second rise like semolina or whole wheat. I do add a little salt and roughly 1/8 c of olive oil to all my basic loaves, which I find adds better flavor. I never spend more than 15 minutes of actual labor on bread making and normally make about 4 loaves a week (I am married to a European, and we love bread!). It is surprising to me how many foodies think bread making is difficult or complicated, and I get a kick out of how blown away they always are that this bread is so delish, so easy, and so fool proof. The only folks I ever knew who ruined it started out with all whole wheat (blech, heavy) or used bad yeast.

[blue room]

I use 1/2 recipe of the Lahey now, for chewy good pizza dough. Tired of the loaves, I think because of the too-gummy-in-the-middle factor. The crust (!) and 1st few slices are great, though, and of course we all learned so much during that huge initial burst of interest after the NY Times article (November 2006, it doesn't seem that long ago...)
Besides, I recently finally got a stand mixer (Cuisinart 800 watts 5.5 quarts shiny jet black), so now I don't have to do no-knead!

[LaureltQ]

I've made it twice and it's been gummy both times even after being cooked to the "correct" internal temp. A sponge based bread is easy enough and my kitchenaid does all the kneading for me, so no reason, IMO.

[mnosyne]

Does your bread dough climb up the hook? I find that really annoying!

[LaureltQ]

Not with the correct speed of the mixer or a wet enough dough.

Of course I've been through 3 kitchenaids in the last 6 years, but with a wet enough dough (RLB's pugliese is a good one) it's no issue.

Another trick is to spray the top of the dough hook, the plate area, with some pam prior to mixing.

[Jen76]

I just started! I finally got a copy of Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day from the library. I can't say I've been entirely successful. When I tried baking it on my stone with a pan of water underneath, the outside of the bread got dark before the inside was cooked enough, so it was gummy. It worked much better using King Arthur Flour's method of putting the slightly risen, formed dough into a *cool* pot in a *cool* oven and letting it sit in the oven during the heating phase. This method has worked really well for me so far. I have yet to try the Lahey method of putting the dough into a very hot pot. Frankly, I'm a bit intimidated by that, since I am quite clumsy and afraid of burning myself.

I have some experimenting to do with liquid amounts - most of my doughs don't seem to be all that wet. I wonder if it's just so dry here in Phoenix that the flour just sucks in all the water. My experiments may have to wait a little longer though. Still fairly warm here and I just got our most recent electric bill (all electric kitchen, unfortunately for me) and ouch!

[rainey]

I have found that it's much easier to load the dough on a hot shallow container than a deep one. For that reason I use an Emile Henry Flame tagine but I have also loaded my dough onto a stone and put the hot casserole upside down on top of it and loaded the dough onto the hot top of a casserole and put the bottom on it upside down.

Using a shallow base not only makes the act of turning out the dough less anxiety producing but it means that you are able to properly slash the dough.

Please tell me more about the King Arthur method. That's new to me. Got a link by chance?

[Jen76]

I don't have a casserole, tagine, etc. My mom has this stoneware casserole/pot thing (seems like the same material my pizza stone is made out of) that consists of two pieces - a shallow (maybe 2-3" deep) round pan type shape and a deep bowl shape. Either piece can function as the top or the bottom. I thought about borrowing that from her and trying it out. Seems like it might be easier to plop the dough into the hot shallow piece and then put the deep bowl piece on top.

Here's the link to the KAF recipe I tried. I had the most success with this and they reply to a commenter about the reasoning behind not preheating the oven.

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipe...

"The reason for the cold oven is that a no knead bread has more water content than a normal dough and it's rise (oven spring) will benefit from the slow oven heating process. This compensates for the lack of kneading and gluten development that normally occurs during the kneading process. If you wish for a more robust crust, you could try placing a pan of water in with the bread to generate steam. This will enable a crispier crust."

[nerdette]

Yes, I still use Lahey's recipe/ method very frequently. I mostly work from home so the slow rise and the no-fuss approach fits pretty well with my schedule. Frankly, I prefer kneaded doughs, but it's kind of nice to have fresh bread for dinner after having spent most day working on my bibliography when I really don't want to mess with kneading.
Baking it in a heavy hot pot was a revelation to me too- I use it whenever I bake bread now.

[oakjoan]

I haven't made no-knead bread for a few months. I thought it'd be too hot to go through any high-heat baking....I was wrong. This summer in Oakland, CA has been unusually cool. After reading this thread, however, I decided to do some no-knead baking soon.

The last bread I made was using Nancy Silverton's home-made starter with grapes. This method takes a long time and, although the resultant bread is amazingly good, I can't get it up to do it more than once a year, if that.

[rainey]

My hat's off to you if you have made a Nancy Silverton starter. Just *reading* her method is enough to give me the vapors! No kidding! I'm in LA and I sometimes fantasize about standing outside her bakery and begging for some starter. Should I ever get off my ample backside and do that, that would be as close as I ever come to it. ;>

[mnosyne]

Definitely yes! I just msde my second no-knead ciabatta with a recipe from foodwishes.com (and a handy video). the two loaves tasted better than any I made using Lahey's formula, and do not require a pot, they were baked on a baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal, with a pan of water in the bottom of the oven. Really nice!

[rainey]

Too funny! So glad you're happy with your results but getting to abandon the pan of water in the bottom of the oven in favor of the hot pot is why I bless Lahey every time I put a loaf in the oven. I totally fried the electronics on an oven with all that humidity over the years. ;>

What's the ciabatta recipe that you really like? In case you feel like sharing...

[mnosyne]

This is the briefest of recipes. If you are interested, look at Chef John's website at foodwishes.com
To get all the dope.

*No-Knead Ciabatta

4 C flour (3 1/2 white; 1/2 wheat)

1/4 tsp yeast

1 1/2 tsp salt

2 C warm water (NOT hot!)

Mix together thoroughly with wooden spoon
Let rise 18 hours covered
Turn out on cornmeal sprinkled baking sheet and form into loaf 
Let rise 2 hours covered
Bake for 35-40 min at 425F with pan of water on bottom of oven

[rainey]

Thanks!