Artisan Bread

Artisan Breads are my favorite types of bread.  There is nothing better than the hard, crisp crust, with the moist, melt in your mouth inside.  Yum!  Recently, my friend brought over a loaf of this succulent stuff.  My family quickly devoured it.  I immediately called her asking for the recipe.  She said she got it from the book "Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day".  I quickly went and got the book.  Needless to say, this is my new favorite book!!  The bread is AMAZING, super easy, and really does only take minutes a day to make.  Seriously!  The bread tastes as good as the artisan loaves from the bakery, and costs about .40 cents per loaf (even less if you use fresh ground whole wheat flour).   The premise behind the bread is that you mix up a batch of dough (each batch makes four 1-pound loaves), let it sit on the counter for 2 hours, and then refrigerate overnight.  Then you can just cut off the amount of dough you want to bake, and put the rest of the dough back in the fridge for up to 2 weeks. As the dough sits in the fridge, it gets this amazing taste..... WOW!  I highly recommend getting this book!!!  It is well worth the $19 on Amazon.com!!!  Here is the basic recipe.  Try it out!  You can do so much with this dough! I have been making double batches of dough, keeping in the fridge, and making fresh, delicious Artisan bread almost daily.  YUM!!

The Master Recipe: Boule (Artisan Free-Form Loaf)
Makes four 1-pound loaves.  The recipe is easily doubled or halved.
3 cups lukewarm water
1 1/2 TBS granulated yeast
1 1/2 TBS kosher or other coarse salt
6 1/2 cups unsifted, unbleached, all purpose white flour
Cornmeal for pizza peel

Directions: 

1. Put warm water in a large bowl.  Add yeast and salt.  
2. Add flour all at once.  Mix with wooden spoon.  You can also mix this in your KitchenAid with the dough hook.  
3. Do not knead. Just make sure all of the flour is incorporated and that there are no dry spots.
4. Cover with a lid (not airtight) and let rise for 2 hours on your counter.
5. Put in refrigerator for at least 3 hours, or overnight.

To Bake:

1. Cut off the amount of dough you wish to use.  Use a generously floured pizza peel (I use a flexible cutting board), to put the formed ball on.  Do not incorporate the flour into the dough.  Just use it so the dough won't stick to your hands.  
2. Put the blob of round dough on the floured or cornmeal covered peel.  Let rest for 40 minutes.
3. 20 minutes before baking, preheat the oven to 450 degrees, with a baking stone placed on the middle rack.  Place an empty pan for holding water on any other shelf that won't interfere with the rising bread.
4. Dust the top of the dough with flour, and slash the top with a tic-tac-toe shape, or with an "x".
5. Slide the blob onto the heated stone.  Immediately pour a cup of water on the second pan and quickly shut the oven door.
6. Bake for about 30 minutes until the crust is nicely browned and firm to the touch.
7. Cool completely on wire rack.
8. Don't store in plastic.  This will cause moisture to soften the crust.  

Happy Baking!

 Ingredients in a big bowl, ready for mixing.  Use a wooden spoon.

Dough is mixed, and covered.  Let sit on counter for 2  hours, then put in fridge.

Dough formed into a ball, resting on cornmeal or flour (or both) pizza peel or cutting board.  You may want to put a piece of parchment under the dough so it slides easy.  Cornmeal works wonderful.  Let rest for about 40 minutes.

20 minutes before baking time, preheat oven to 450 degrees.  Put pizza stone in oven to preheat, as well as a pan.  When oven is preheated, slide blobs of dough onto the stone.  Immediately put water in the pan, and quickly close the door.  Bake.

The finished product.  Yummy!!!!

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