Loaf 1

I will probably only number these loaves for the first few.

I read a few web sites, including this one: http://steamykitchen.com/168-no-knead-bread-revisited.html. "So easy a 4 year old can do it", it said. Her 4 year old son is adorable.

I was charmed, so I used her version of the recipe rather than the NYT version. Not much difference, just a little less water.

I read posts from a lot of people who had difficulty with the dough sticking to the towel. Frankly, I don't know why a towel is needed. Does there have to be some sort of "breathing" or air transfer? I would imagine that if the towel was heavily floured, as recommended, the air flow would be essentially cut off.

In any event I made her version. After 14 hours I heavily floured a board, poured the dough onto the flour, folded it and then put it in a smaller bowl to proof, on top of a well floured piece of parchment paper. I covered it with another piece of parchment paper, afraid that if I covered it with a towel it would stick.

The dough rose in 2 hours, but never reached the top of the bowl so the upper piece of parchment paper was untouched.

I picked up the dough, brushed off as much of the flour from the bottom as possible, turned it upside down (folded side up) and dropped it into the hot dutch oven.

The result was ... good, but not really worth the effort. The crust was soft and there wasn't much taste to the crumb. But it was good enough to make me want to try it again.