An Easy, Simple Bread	My very first bread!
(Adapted from an article in the New York Times) Ingredients:
3 cups Unbleached flour 1 Tablespoon Kosher salt (halve that for table salt) ½ Teaspoon Yeast 1½ cups Water 1  Egg (To be used tomorrow for glazing)
Process: Mix all the dry stuff together in a bowl to get an even distribution. If you're going to add flavor ingredients (see below), do so now. Add the appropriate amount of water (flavoring-dependent, as per below). Cover the bowl of dough (so it's air tight, per the NY Times). Let sit for 12-14 hours, somewhat accommodating your schedule. ... (12-14 hours later) ... Sprinkle enough flour onto a flat surface and your hands so the dough will not stick to them. Pour the dough onto the surface and fold into itself and press about half a dozen times. After the final fold, work the mass so no crease of flour is left to form a separation inside. The outside sgould remain fairly powdery. Sweep the loose flour from the work surface and sprinkle it onto a towel (like a tea towel, not terrycloth - you don't want the dough sticking onto the hairs!). You may need to add some flour if you find the dough sticks to the towel. Pick up the dough ball, place it onto the towel, and fold the towel over to cover it. Let the dough sit in the towel for two hours. At one and a half hours, place a deep-dish 9-inch or so pan/caserole and lid into the oven and preheat to 450°F. ... (about 20 minutes after turning on the oven = 1 hour, 50 minutes for the bread to have rested) ... Beat an egg with about two Tablespoons of water to make a wash. Remove the pan/caserole and quickly (to preserve heat, but safely): pour the dough into the pan/caserole, brush the top of the dough with the egg wash (this is the glue to hold the seeds and salt), sprinkle the top of the dough with sesame seeds and kosher salt (all per your preference), and seat the lid onto the pan/caserole and replace into the oven. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes. When time is up, remove the lid and continue baking until the top has browned to your liking (usually 5 or so minutes). Remove, cool, eat. Some tips: Timing: If you let it sit too long, the yeast dies and the loaf collapses. Too little time, it doesn't rise enough. 13 hours is ideal. Plan ahead - I'll sometimes mix before I go to work, then bake in the late evening. You can use the same pot to bake the bread in for mixing/rising the dough. The lid should serve as the cover. It's not air tight, but this seems to have had no ill effect in this kitchen. I use an iron, enameled, oval, 2.75-quart pot from Le Creuset (thanks, Nic!!). The lid handle is rated to only 350°F, but I've baked maybe four dozen loaves so far and the handle is still okay. If the handle ever dies, I'll replace it with a manly-man handle, like a metal drawer pull. The shape and size of the bread is much more loaf-like, and makes for more conventional sandwiches. It's nice to be able to bake two loaves at a time. Saves on energy. Some day I'll get a third pot - I think they'll all fit in at the same time, and I don't seem to have a problem finding folks who want the extra loaf. I use kosher salt, which my wife tells me is about half as strong as the iodized stuff. So I use a shy tablespoon of that. Flavorings This recipe makes a very basic bread. You can spice it up with all sorts of additives. I use various toppings to help identify the breads. Rosemary and Kalamata olive has been my favorite flavored bread. Add a half cup of quartered Kalamata olives and a third of a cup of chopped, fresh rosemary (it's nearly a weed in our garden) to the dough. It'll all rise AOK together. I top it with sea salt (really big flaky stuff). Similarly, I've just tried Kalamata and feta cheese. Eh. I used a half cup both of quartered olives and of crumbled feta, but that really wasn't enough cheese. I also should have cut back on the water. This is a salty recipe, so go easy on the salt topping, or maybe even skip it altogether. Caroline's suggested Cheddar cheese and jalapeno pepper is becoming my new favorite. Add a third of a cup of tiny cubes of cheddar cheese and two or three very finely cubed jalapeno pepper skins (do not use the seeds or ribs inside the pepper). Alternatively, I use two almost-tablespoons of the dried jalapeno flakes that Costco used to sell in pint-sized containers. There's less pepper flavor, but more heat. I originally added a half cup of darkly-fried onions. They didn't add much for the extra effort. I top the bread with paprika. I tried a knock-off of the above: cheddar cheese and bacon. Add three well-done strips crushed into tiny pieces and a third of a cup of cheddar cheese. Not bad, but perhaps a forth strip would have been better. I'll probably try this again, but I'm ambivalent so far. Seed Loaf is a new concoction, and this one's extremely popular. Mix in: Four tablespoons shelled sunflower seeds Three tablespoons shelled pumpkin seeds Three tablespoons rolled oats One tablespoon flax seeds One teaspoon fenel seeds One teaspoon mustard seeds One teaspoon black sesame seeds I use more flax seeds for the topping. My wife's favorite is my rye bread. Rye flour doesn't have gluten, so don't replace the wheat flour totally. I substitute only one cup of the wheat flour with the rye. Then I add a shy two tablespoons of caraway seeds. Also, I cut back a bit on the salt to help with the rising. I don't use any topping. The cranberry bread turned out great! I used a half cup of "Craisins", a raisin-like form of cranberries. For the top of the bread, I sprinkled pearl sugar and cinnamon. Watch out - this stuff browns fast and dark in that final uncovered 5 minutes of baking! The raisin bread has been a flop, but I think it's because the cinnamon (2 tablespoons) killed the yeast or something. I'll try again with no cinnamon at all. Judging by the cranberry bread, I think this might work. I tried parsley and garlic. It just didn't come out right. I had crushed the garlic (4 large cloves), but am thinking I should have cubed it instead. Because of the freshly washed (and wet) parsley, I should have cut back on the water there, too. Keep tuned, I might try that again some day.
A loaf of rye (left) and plain (right)