Made It Loved It: No Knead Artisan Bread

Monday I posted a recipe for gluten fee Asian Chicken Wraps, today it is gluten and carbs galore because that's how us omnivores roll. Okay, it could just be me.

I am warning you now, if the site of uncensored pictures of complex carbohydrates and globs of gluten offends you, you might want to look away now.

No Knead Artisan Bread: combine a few simple ingredients in a bowl, let it sit overnight then bake it in a preheated cast iron Dutch oven. Am I the last person in the blogosphere to find out about this method of bread making?  From the looks of my Pinterest boards and my fellow food bloggers posts, I might be.

And the irony is, I didn't learn about it from one of those sources, but from my neighbor.  She brought me some to taste and I ate it all without sharing a single crumb with the boys.

And not only did she share the bread and was nice enough to share the recipe from Simply So Good, she also let me borrow her La Creuset pot to make it! Isn't it pretty?

I am not sure what inspired me to make it Caprese bread. Probably because it is summer and I love the flavors of tomato, cheese and basil. I followed Janet's recipe and cooking method exactly with the addition of chopped sun dried tomatoes, grated mozzarella, and chopped fresh basil to the dough before it rose overnight. Then I took it to another level of deliciousness and added more cheese and sun dried tomatoes to the top when I removed the lid the last 15 minutes to brown.

I gave my neighbor part of the loaf as a thank you and set about enjoying the rest of the loaf myself.

I dipped some in olive oil and Balsamic vinegar to add the last Caprese ingredient.

I also made a salami sandwich with homegrown tomatoes, mozzarella and basil plus olive oil and Balsamic vinegar smeared on the bread.

After I polished off that loaf, I wondered "Does the pot have to be cast iron or could I use one of my two clay bakers?" Yes, I have two covered clay pots:

My Romertopf knock off:

My Pampered Chef covered baker:

My online research said a resounding yes! and some claimed the clay was better than the cast iron for sourdough. So, I pulled my sourdough starter out of hibernation in the back of the fridge to give it a try. First, I had to wake up the starter for a few days.

The bread was a disaster because I didn't follow a recipe, but tried to freestyle it. The crust was beautiful, but the bread was tough because I overworked it when I kept adding extra flour because it was too sticky. I dumped it in the trash after one bite.

Yesterday, I tried again following the recipe and method detailed on Breadtopia. I followed the recipe exactly, including the addition of a little whole wheat flour and weighing the flours. Yes, you read it, I followed a recipe exactly!

I am normally not a big fan of video demonstrations because I don't have a lot of time to sit around and listen to someone tell me about something when I could just scan the written text to glean the information I need. BUT, the video was helpful for me to see what the dough should look like before you leave it alone to rise. Kind of like this:

The result was fantastic! Except mine baked faster than the recipe stated, especially on the bottom. I will need to lower my oven temperature the next time I try it.

I am not going to post the recipes. Sorry to make you click again. But, the recipes and descriptions on these two pages do a far better job of explaining the method than I could:

Simply So Good: Crusty Bread
Breadtopia: Sourdough No Knead Method

Until next time, happy eating.
~Audrey