No-Knead Sourdough

Here is another delicious no-knead bread to add to your repertoire.  It's made in a similar fashion as other no-knead breads, but with the your sourdough starter instead of a little bit of active dry yeast.  Sometime, hopefully soon, I hope to write a tutorial on sourdough.  Sadly, I feel as though I'm a genius on the subject yet and I in no way want to lead you astray.  As I have mentioned earlier, the first attempt at a sourdough starter was a little bit lackluster and I had difficulty starting it.  I sort of 'cheated' and used a little tiny bit of active dry yeast.  I really mean it, MAYBE a 1/4th of a teaspoon, but more like an 1/8th.  Then I combined it with some flour and water in a large jar and let it sit. 

But sit it did not.  I came back from class a few hours later (remember, I was making this my senior year of college) and it had exploded all over my kitchen.  Well, not technically, but I did had the blob reincarnated.  It was spewing out of its jar, onto the counter and I think a little even crawled onto the floor.  And I had no idea how to stop it.  I remember hearing once (I think it was Alton Brown?) that "yeast hates salt" - i.e. it stops it from growing.  It helped, but then it never came alive again.  When I made some bread with said starter, it had the right texture but no sour taste.  I read more about sourdough and tried to revive it (partially successfully), but it was laid to rest in a plastic garbage pail tomb before my move out west.  My current starter, given to me by my friend Ann, is fantastic!  So sour!  The texture is consistent and it's not fussy!

This no-knead wasn't as sour as other loaves of bread that I've made, but it was easy, definitely had a chewier texture and a 'sour' aftertaste.  But the crust, OH, the crust… it was wonderful!  So thick and with the right amour of crunch.  It was wonderful on my sandwich I made for lunch the next day or on the peanut butter toast I made for breakfast the day after.  If you're uncomfortable with sourdoughs but want to try your hand at making them, I recommend this recipe!

No-Knead Sourdough
Ingredients:

• 15 oz bread flour (about 3 cups)
• 1.5 tsp salt
• 11 oz lukewarm water (1.25 cups, plus a tablespoon)
• 1/2 cup sourdough starter, fed

Directions:

1. Mix the salt with the flour, and the sourdough with the warm water. Then combine all the ingredients and mix for 20 seconds or just until all of the flour is wet. If you work the mixture, you will have a loaf with a tight crumb.  I wanted one that had big air pockets, so I worked it as little as possible.
2. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and then a tea towel (this helps trap in heat), and leave it to rise at room temperature overnight (about 18 hours).
3. The next day dust the dough with a bit more flour and fold the sides into the middle to form a round loaf, dust a towel with stone ground cornmeal (or coarse salt) and place the loaf onto it seam side down, putting more cornmeal on top then fold the towel over.
4. Let the loaf rise until it has doubled in size again. When the loaf has almost doubled in size, but the dutch oven in the oven and set it for 475 degrees (it is important to put the dutch oven into a cold oven so it doesn't experience thermal shock).
5. When the dutch oven is rocket hot, place (toss) the dough, seam side up, into the dutch oven, and put the lid back on. Bake for 25 minutes, during this time the lid will trap moisture from the dough which will allow the crust to stay stretchy as the bread continues to rise. Then take the lid off and turn the oven up to 475. Take the loaf out of the oven once it is brown and crusty, 15-20 more minutes.

Whole Wheat Tortillas

Other than that one time you had a tortilla pressed in front of you at a Chiptole restaurant, have you ever really had a homemade tortilla?  Ok, maybe you have, but have you made them?  Seriously, they aren't that hard, and if you're afraid of working with yeast, these surely don't have yeast!  Pressed for time?  You can leave out the step for letting the dough rise for an hour after forming it into a large ball.  Have I convinced you enough to how easy these are to make?

Immediately after making these, I quickly assembled a standard lunch of the Outward Bound and Four-Trails trips of my past: a peanut butter and honey wrap roll up.  The best part of this was that because the tortillas were still warm from being hot off the griddle, the peanut butter melted, swirled in with the honey and made me one happy camper.  It also provided me with a nice flashback to eating these of the side of some road with our bikes in Wisconsin with Meg, Allie, Kat and Joan by my side or hurriedly eating while canoeing down a river in Canada, trying to avoid the mosquitos.

A few days later, these were used in bean & corn quesadillas that I made for my sister and I after we organized and cleaned our parents garage.  Seriously.  We're that good.  Now you go be good and make these!!

Whole Wheat Tortillas
Adapted from Rick Bayless

Ingredients:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour, plus a little extra for rolling the tortillas
• 1 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 5 tablespoons shortening
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• about 3/4 cup very warm tap water 

Directions:

1. To make the dough, combine the flours and shortening in a large mixing bowl, working the two ingredients together with a pastry cutter (or your hands… doesn’t matter), until completely incorporated.  This should feel like wet sand.  Dissolve the salt in the water, pour about 2/3 cup of it over the dry ingredients and immediately work it in with a fork… or once again your hands (seriously, hands are the best kitchen gadget…ever).  The dough will be in large lumps at this point, not one big ball o’ dough.  If all the dry ingredients haven't been dampened, add the rest of the liquid (plus a little more, if necessary).  Scoop the dough onto your work surface and knead until smooth.  It should be medium-stiff consistency -- definitely not firm, but not quite as soft as most bread dough either.  Let this rest for about an hour.
2. Divide the dough into 12 portions and roll each into a ball.  Set them on a plate, cover with plastic wrap and let rest at least 30 minutes (to make the dough less springy, easier to roll).
3. Roll and griddle-bake the tortillas.  Heat an ungreased griddle or heavy skillet over medium to medium-high heat.
4. On a lightly floured surface, roll out a portion of the dough into an even 7-inch circle.  Flatten a ball of dough, flour it, then roll forward and back across it; rotate a sixth of a turn and roll forward and back again; continue rotating and rolling until you reach a 7-inch circle… a very very thin 7-inch circle.
5. Lay the tortilla on the hot griddle (you should hear a faint sizzle and see an almost immediate bubbling across the surface).  After 30 to 45 seconds, when there are browned splotches underneath, flip it over.  Bake 30 to 45 seconds more, until brown spots appear; don't overbake the tortilla or it will become crisp.  Remove and wrap in a cloth napkin placed in a tortilla warmer.  Roll and griddle-bake the remaining tortillas in the same manner and stacking them one on top of the other.
6. Fill with something yummy or snack on it plain.

Crusty No-Knead Bread

I have been baking bread for about 3 years.  Sometimes the bread comes out beautiful, crusty, flavorful, and just like I wanted.  Other times I knead bread for hours and hours praying that I will be rewarded with a bread that was worth the effort.  Usually the longer I work at getting a bread to be perfect, the worse it turns out (not ALWAYS though - sometimes my effort is graciously rewarded).  I was a little skeptical about trying this recipe - a bread the promised all the results with none of the effort?  Alas, it is true!  While I was studying for Ethnobotany and writing up some things for my journalism classes, the dough slowly rose in my kitchen and I don't think it could have been easier to cook.  I did use the "speedy" recipe for no-knead bread (about 4 and a half hours compared to 12 to 18 hours) from The New York Times, but I plan on trying the original no-knead bread sometime in the future.  Check back in the morning to see how the bread tastes (the housemates and I are using it for our sandwiches tomorrow).

Speedy No-Knead Bread
Adapted from the New York Times

Ingredients:

• 3 cups bread flour (I used Kind Arthur Bread Flour)
• 1 packet ( 1/4 ounce) instant yeast
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt (I used Kosher Salt)
• Oil as needed (Pam cooking spray works fine)

Directions:

1. Combine flour, yeast and salt in a large bowl. Add 1 1/2 cups water and stir until blended; dough will be shaggy. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest about 4 hours at warm room temperature.
2. Lightly oil a work surface and place dough on it; fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest 30 minutes more.
3. At least a half-hour before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees. Put a 6-to-8-quart heavy covered pot (I used a dutch oven) in oven as it heats. When dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide your hand under dough and put it into pot, seam side up. Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes.
4. Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes, until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on a rack for about 30 minutes before cutting into and enjoying!

Look at that texture!