Friday, July 24, 2015

Real Bread


Uh oh - I made real bread yesterday, and I've eaten a lot of it already.  I have a good excuse - a member of our investment club brought samples of the flour her family sells.  It's called Shepherd's Grain, and is lovely light brown wheat flour grown with a focus on sustainable farming.  I used the New York Times No-Knead Bread recipe and it is really delicious!



The NY Times no-knead bread recipe came from Jim Lahey at the Sullivan Street Bakery in New York City.  It's easy and produces a loaf of artisan-style bread with a chewy brown crust.  I was a bit worried when I mixed up the dough and found with this flour it is much more brown, like whole wheat flour dough, than when I use regular white flour.  I was afraid it might not rise enough for the bread.




In this recipe you just mix the dough and let it sit at room temperature for about 17 hours.  Yup, seventeen hours.  It rises and becomes bubbly and then you pat it out and shape into a ball for a shorter (2 hour) second rise.


While waiting for the second rise, you heat the oven and a heavy covered dish very hot, to 450°.  Cooking the bread in the covered dish apparently keeps it moist from steam.  Here's what my loaf looked like when it came out of the oven.  It rose pretty much the same amount as white flour, although this bread looks and tastes more like whole wheat.




It's so nice to have some real gluteny chewy bread!  I won't do this very often - this is the first time since writing this blog - but I'm glad that I am eating a product that was grown and processed in a sustainable and healthy manner, for both the environment and myself!




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