thoughts on the no knead bread

Ever swimming against the trend, I only recently got around to trying that no-knead bread...you know the one...Lahey's bread, Bittman's article, all the cool kids are making it...or is that soooo last month? grin Like I said, I'm not so hot on following the trends...

In looking up those links, it's obvious that the recipe got a lot of people talking, and baking. That's so cool! As a long-time bread baker, I think it is marvelous that there are so many people making decent bread - many for the first time. Anything that gets people who have fear of yeast (FOY), as many have confessed, baking bread is a step in the right direction.

That the bread people are baking is a crusty, open-crumbed rustic bread, which is often seen as a more 'advanced' bread is particularly sweet. Then there is the personalization; every baker seems to use a different style baking pot and people are adding all sorts of tasty stuff: sourdough, whole-wheat, olives, herbs, and even chocolate-cherry. Even new bread bakers are experimenting with a bread recipe. That's pretty amazing.

        round of applause to all the new bread bakers!

I've been working with this sort of bread dough for a number of years: wet dough, long ferment, just without the covered pot in the oven. (I used to bake bread under a cloche, which provides much the same effect when combined with a pizza stone, but even without one, I am happy with the crust my bread gets.) This lack of novelty probably accounts for my failure to hasten to the kitchen when I read Bittman's article. I looked at it as another recipe that used techniques in which I was already conversant. From that perspective, there wasn't anything revolutionary. No need to rush the barricades.

Besides, I am annoyed. Not at the popularity of the bread or anything like that. I have similar recipes I like, I don't particularly need this one right now. What gets me is that there is no movement to let the FOY go, just to shift it to kneading. Come on kids, this isn't tough stuff. Grab the bread dough, smoosh it around for a minute or two, rest it for 20, smoosh for another minute and it's done. Nothing to be scared of and it doesn't even take much time. 

Yet, I still felt the tug of possibility: what if I was missing something? When even experienced bakers, bakers I respect, said good things about it, I decided I had to give it a whirl.

So, what do I think? Well, truth be told, it is great food blog bread.

First, it is very pretty, no doubt about that. Visibly crisp crust. Beautiful open crumb. Yep. That's some gorgeous bread. Photographs beautifully, too. You could take shots of this stuff all day long. Trust me, people have. Heck, I have a few of my own. (Hi. My name is kitchenMage and I am a bread pornographer...)

It is also dead simple to produce bread that pretty. The slack dough, long ferment, and baking method combine to make a very forgiving recipe. Served still warm with a slather of butter, it's an impressive loaf, especially for someone who seldom, or never, bakes.

Well, except in one aspect. It tastes like...not much. It's not even bad enough to be notable. Flavorless, gummy, and an hour out of the oven the crust starts to toughen. Bread to make you believe in the Atkins diet. This is revolutionary?

I made two batches -just in case I screwed up the first - refrigerating the second one while it fermented to see if it made any difference in flavor, as it does with pain la ancienne. Well...no, not so much.

There was a moment of self-examination, second guessing my baking skills (is it just me, everyone else seems to love this bread...did i just leave out the salt? both times?) But you know what? David Lebovitz agrees with me. And so does the lovely bird-kisser at Food Migration whose name I can neither recall nor find. I also found this at Food Migration: "...if you don't knead it with your own two hands, how do you get the love into it?" Many of the mages at whose floury elbows I apprenticed would totally agree!

Yet I was determined to find something of value in this experience, because there must be something useful to pass along. So here you go, two things about no knead bread.

The dough on the left was fermented on the counter, the one on the in the refrigerator, something that usually improves flavor. Not so much here. What it did do, however, is make the dough much easier to work with. I weighed ingredients for both batches so they are within a few grams of each other, but look at the difference between them!

The loaf on the left is this oozy ball of wet, while the one on the right let me fold it (also good for gluten development) and 30 minutes later you could still see the fold! There was no visible difference in the texture of the bread or how much it rose...and they tasted the same, for whatever that's worth.

The other thing that was helpful was letting the dough rise on the parchment paper it was to be baked on. Yes, even inside the dutch oven. I simply placed a parchment sheet inside the basket I put the dough in to rise and put the dough on top of that. When I was ready to bake, I lifted the parchment and put it directly in the preheated dutch oven. No deflated bread from moving it off the rising surface and no sticky mess to clean up. Now, that is, even if not revolutionary, a simple change in the recipe that would make it less hassle. Maybe you could use the two minutes you save on cleanup to do something else bread related...like knead it.

Comments

[kevin]

KM,
My English muffin rings arrived yesterday, so I'll be trying the NK recipe to make English muffins soon.

[gerda]

the no knead-thing definitely took my fear of yeast.

i had never made bread before, but i made a couple of batches of the no knead ... and then i switched to more "sophisticated" recipes (plus kneading) ... and now i wonder why i ever thought baking bread would be difficult ...

[Jenna]

Well, depends on the recipe I think. There are a lot of versions of this floating around, and a few are tasty. (I did try the one you are speaking of though... and you're right. Its not much of a muchness as my mom says.) I think one of the appealing factors of the NK idea for me is the fact that unless I use my stand mixer, I can't knead properally. I have fibromyalgia, and long kneading times just aren't happening. Same with my mom, and several of my friends. This is one bread, that with a little tinkering, can be made without investing in a stand mixer or bread machine.

Me? I just use the mixer! (lol)

[Jenna]

Well, depends on the recipe I think. There are a lot of versions of this floating around, and a few are tasty. (I did try the one you are speaking of though... and you're right. Its not much of a muchness as my mom says.) I think one of the appealing factors of the NK idea for me is the fact that unless I use my stand mixer, I can't knead properally. I have fibromyalgia, and long kneading times just aren't happening. Same with my mom, and several of my friends. This is one bread, that with a little tinkering, can be made without investing in a stand mixer or bread machine.

Me? I just use the mixer! (lol)

[brenda]

Well, except in one aspect. It tastes like...not much. It's not even bad enough to be notable. Flavorless, gummy, and an hour out of the oven the crust starts to toughen. Bread to make you believe in the Atkins diet. This is revolutionary?

This was totally my experience with this bread. One thing that helps is to increase the salt a lot. That said, I have a similar recipe that includes a bit more kneading (in fact, the salt in that one is actually kneaded into the bread after the first rise) then rises overnight in the fridge on the baking pan. Very similar crust, texture, but a much better flavor. I do like the cooking method, so that bit at least I'll keep.

[Dylan]

Never have my arms been in as good of shape as they are, as from kneading dough once or twice a week for the past year, plus living/lifting a three year old. I had to laugh, hard, about the no kneading being the selling point. For me it kinda sounded like having bread without making it, which I guess is a great idea for some, just not me either. When I read this post it made me think back to trying a sourdough version of this that, well yeah, was somewhat lacking in flavor. I didn't really say anything about it cause I was thinking I wasn't really qualified......thanks for using your rank out there and saying so.

[rose]

I really like the method and the crust of this bread and I've mixed in some rye for improved flavor but I simply cannot get rid of the 'moistness' inside of the bread. I've gotten it out of the gummy stage but its still sticky.

Has anyone been able to get this particular problem solved?

[Carolyn]

I like making this bread for one reason: because it's easier on my hands. Both my mom and I have miserable nerve degeneration. We can't knead by hand. This dough lets me bake without having to pull out the KitchenAid. (We have a tiny kitchen; the mixer can't be out all the time.) I use 200g of organic bread flour, 100g organic whole wheat and 70g various "fun" flours like chestnut, oat, garbanzo, etc. I also hold back about 1/2 cup of dough each time to use as a starter, which adds flavor.

[chris brandow]

it has been noted that the salt in the recipe is far too little. that obviously has a big impact on flavor. I am one of the many bread novices drawn in by this recipe, and I found, following others, that 10 hours in the fridge followed by 10 hours on the counter, folding and dumping into pot at 500 works wonders for flavor. I find it quite full and nutty now.