This recipe is super simple. The bread comes out with an awesome crust and the inside is spongy, with a natural and earthy taste. All for extremely low effort. I wasn’t interested in making bread until I heard of a “no-knead” recipe. And I wasn’t interested in having yet another appliance (bread maker) in the house. Kids can definitely learn this recipe.

I got this recipe from “No-Knead Bread 101” on Youtube. I watched it several times on repeat (the first half) before attempting. It’s my favorite bread video so far. The presenter also shows how the texture of the bread dough should be during the proofing stages. I recommend watching the first 6-7 min.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0bPt-Sz2-c&feature=youtu.be

I’m using his “Turbo” (bake soon) recipe.

• 14oz filtered water. Tap water has chlorine and water molds. These affect shelf life and taste.
• 1 tsp salt. Table salt is fine. Chunky salt won’t mix well.
• 1+1/4 tsp yeast.
• 1 tbs oil (I used organic olive oil)
• 3+1/2c organic whole wheat flour

Dough prep
Prep time: 5-10 min
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This is the dough rising and yeast developing a culture.

Warm up the water (under 100 deg F). Stir in the yeast. This will wake up the yeast. The water will get cloudy and you’ll smell it if the yeast is still good. I used a glass measuring cup. If you’re doing the overnight version, no need to warm up the water.

Aerate the flour if it’s been sitting for a while (basically I scoop the flour a bit in the bag to mix it, then I start measuring). Measure out 3 1/2 cups and add in the salt.

Mix the wet and dry ingredients in a large bowl that has room at the top (incl the oil). Mix them so most of the flour is picked up, but it should still look messy and unevenly mixed. Check out the video for this part. The yeast will do the rest of the mixing.

Initial proof
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Cover the top of the bowl with plastic wrap, and put it somewhere warm that isn’t drafty. Need to preserve as much moisture as possible here, so a towel won’t do (plus a towel could have mold in it unless it’s freshly laundered). I put my bread bowl in the study where it’s pretty warm.

Let it sit for 1+1/2 hrs if you used the larger portion of yeast (you want to bake it in a few hours).
Let it sit for 8-10 hrs overnight if you used the smaller portion of yeast. I put mine in the fridge, which I read slows the yeast culture a bit, otherwise, after enough time, the dough will deflate.

I put a towel over the plastic wrap for insulation.

Second proof
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Putting the dough into a bread pan.

Open up the dough just a bit so it deflates a little. Sprinkle maybe a tablespoon of flour over it so the outside’s not too sticky.
Grease the bread pan. I used olive oil.

Put the dough in it.

Cover it in some way that the bread can expand up out of the bread pan. Some people put a 2nd bread pan on it like a hat. Because it’s going to rise some more. I put plastic wrap on mine but I did it too tightly and my bread didn’t rise very much.

Let it sit for 30 min.

Bake
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400F for 40 min.
I like to brush on a little bit of olive oil on the top for color.

Your loaf will come out at least looking like this. Mine was a bit short because it didn’t get enough space to rise in the 2nd proof.