Artisan Bread
I know what you're saying…"Really Kelly? Bread baking in JULY?!?" Yes! It's delicious and you can do it late at night or early in the morning. A dear friend of mine introduced this recipe to me last year and ever since I've been obsessed! It's similar to the pizza dough in that there is no kneading and you can keep it in your fridge for up to two weeks! Just pull off a small amount for fresh bread each night. You can also freeze the dough for use later as well.
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups Water, Hot
- 2 ¼ teaspoons Instant Dry Yeast
- 2 ¼ teaspoons Kosher Salt
- 3 ¼ cups Flour, White Whole Wheat
Containers
Supplies
Cooking Instructions
Freeze For Later Cooking Day Directions
These directions help you cook or prepare this meal PRIOR to being frozen for serving later (see Serving Day Directions when you are ready to prepare it to eat).
Why would I want to freeze this?
- In the large bowl, combine water, yeast, and salt. Stir together. No need to wait until yeast is bubbly.
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Make From Frozen Serving Day Directions
These directions help you cook or reheat this meal AFTER it's been frozen for when you are ready to eat it.
- Thaw: Countertop
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Make It Now Cooking Directions
These directions are for cooking this recipe to serve immediately and NOT to freeze for later.
- In the large bowl, combine water, yeast, and salt. Stir together. No need to wait until yeast is bubbly.
- Add in flour all at once and stir together. All portions of the dough should be moistened so that no flour is left uncombined.
- Cover mixture with lid or plastic wrap and leave at room temperature for two hours, or until doubled in size.
- Place bowl of dough, still covered, in fridge overnight and up to 14 days.
- How to make a loaf: Sprinkle pizza peel – or parchment paper, if you don’t own a peel – very generously with corn meal. You want to make sure your loaf doesn’t stick when you slide it off onto the pizza stone or cookie sheet.
- Remove bowl from refrigerator. Sprinkle a “cloak” of flour over the dough – you’re not trying to mix it in or make your dough less sticky.
- Cut off a grapefruit -sized piece of dough, and pull all four sides, one at a time, to the bottom to form a ball. Flour hands if dough is sticking to them. Don’t worry about making the bottom of the loaf look smooth.
- Let loaf rest for 40 minutes (or more, if kitchen is drafty or cool). Most of the actual rising will take place in the oven.
- 20 minutes before baking, place pizza stone in oven on the second to bottom rack, and place broiler pan on the rack below that; preheat to 450.
- After 40 minutes have passed, sprinkle top of loaf with flour (to keep knife from sticking). Using a serrated knife, make two 1/4 inch cuts crosswise on the top of the loaf. Now, with a quick motion, flick the loaf onto the pizza stone, then pour a cup of hot water into the broiler pan. Shut oven as quickly as possible to retain steam.
- Bake at 450 for 30-40 minutes, or until crust is browned and hardened.
- Remove from oven and place on cooling rack; don’t slice in until cooled because it will release essential moisture.
- To be used in recipes. (If you make extra dough, you can freeze dough after first rise in portions, wrap in parchment and store in freezer bag. You can also freeze the loaf after baking in a freezer bag.}
Nutrition Facts
- Servings Per Recipe
- 8 Servings
- Serving Size
- 1/8 of loaf Amount Per Serving
- Calories
- 188
- Total Fat
- 1g
- Saturated Fat
- 0g
- Trans Fat
- 0g
- Cholesterol
- 0mg
- Sodium
- 534mg
- Total Carbohydrates
- 41g
- Fiber
- 6g
- Sugar
- 0g
- Protein
- 8g
- WW Freestyle
- 5
54 Comments
Join the discussionThe first rise, meaning the 40 minute rise? Then you can freeze it?
The first rise is the rise in the bowl then yes you can portion it out and freeze it then.
Have you ever done this with whole wheat flour?
Not this particular recipe, but there is another book Healthy Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a day that has a WW recipe in it!
I love this book and have made many a recipe in it. I mostly use whole wheat flour in my bread recipes and they always turn out fantastic. I refuse to buy packaged bread anymore. Keeping the dough in the fridge is the best way to have a fresh loaf every morning. There is no better way to wake the family up in the morning than with the smell of fresh baked bread.
Can’t wait to try it! Does the dough have to go in fridge overnight before you bake it?
Thanks for sharing all of the great recipes!
You can put it in the fridge overnight it’s better for shaping, but you can bake right after the first rise.
Used the proportions indicated and the dough looked very wet-added 2 1/2 more cups of flour. Is the dough supposed to be very wet? It’s in the kitchen aid as I type! Thanks for your great website.
Yes it’s supposed to be wet!! I would not add more flour. Your loaves could be dry just as a warning.
This does not look like normal bread dough – it is very wet, almost a batter. That’s how you can do it without kneading.
Any suggestions if you don’t have a pizza stone or a broiler pan. Or a second rack, for that matter. (renting, it was missing when we moved in)
Lisa you can cook it on a cookie sheet, no need to preheat it. And instead of a broiler pan, get a spray bottle filled with cold water. Place your loaf in the oven and spray a few sprays on the side of the oven then shut the door and wait a few seconds. Then open again and spray again, repeat for the first minute or so then you can leave it. Basically you’re just recreating the steam process for the first few minutes of baking!
Thanks!
Any ideas if you can prepare in a bread machine? I am not sure yet ho to change bread recipes to go in the bread machine but I am trying to use mine as much as possible and this looks like it should work in order to mix and proof it 🙂
Hi Alison, I’m not sure if it will work in a bread machine to bake it because you are really striving for a harder “sourdough” type crust that I assume you can only achieve with the steam in the beginning of the oven. HOWEVER, that being said it’s worth a try to see what will happen. The book did not mention a bread machine at all, so it may be worth checking out from your library. Good luck!
It will NOT work in a bread machine. The cook time will be wrong, and it will likely be a mess.
I have made this a few times now and the family loves it. I am having a really hard time with it sticking to the parchement paper with cornmeal, any suggestions. It is very difficult to get it on the baking stone. Christe
I’m so happy to hear that it’s a hit in your house too! I would say add some flour mixed with the cornmeal and be generous. You’re basically trying to create a mobile surface for the loaf to slide off of onto the baking stone. Similar to if you were using a pizza peel. Hope that helps!
Thanks! I will try it today!
I just bake it on the parchment paper.
I made this a couple of weeks ago. I baked 1 loaf (which was fantastic!!) and then froze the other 3 dough balls. My question is how long do I need to let it set out before baking? Thanks!
I would just let it thaw in your refrigerator overnight. Then let it sit out for about 40 minutes total before baking, 20 minutes before preheat and 20 minutes during preheat.
I’ve tried this recipe twice in the last few weeks and both times I ended up with really dense bread. Do I need to give it longer for the second rising? Or any other thoughts on what I might be doing wrong? Thanks!!! The flavor is great, so I really want to figure out this recipe and make it work.
Stephanie I would try some new flour, and then let it rise a little longer than normal. Also the water steam at the very beginning of the bake helps!
I had this happen to me also but then I went out to a tile shop and purchased some unglazed quarry tile (it has to be this kind b/c the glazed quarry tile has lead in it) and washed them with just water, otherwise they will absorb the taste of soap and let them dry completely. I got 12-6x6x1/2″ squares for my oven and stacked them on top of each other–preheated the oven for half an hour and used a boiler pan for the water underneath and the next loaf of bread I baked came out significantly better! The bread was not dense or hard at all–had a nice shell but the “homemade pizza stone” really made a significant difference. Also, it was super cheap–$7.48. I tried Lowes and Home Depot but they didn’t carry them.
Thanks for the tip! I baked two loaves today. The first one came out really dense so I let the second one sit a little longer before baking. It came out really dense too. The flavor is great though. My 3 year old LOVED it, so I’m happy 🙂 I’m using fresh flour and yeast but I baked the bread on a cookie sheet. I’ll pick up some tiles or a baking stone this week and try that.
Just a little update I wanted to share: I have not been able to go to town and find a baking stone but I remembered last night that my Granny use to bake bread in a cast iron skillet. I tried that, a cast iron skillet preheated like you would the stone, and got great results! The texture of the bread is so much lighter. Yay! As far as the dense bread goes, I sliced it really thin, brushed with olive oil and made Melba toast. I gave it to my 3 year old and she was very impressed that “Mommy made chips!”. 😀
Thanks for the advice!
You can also bake this in a large, round casserole dish. Then you can also skip the steam (because it’s sealed, so it self steams). Remove the lid for the last 15 min.
very good! I was leary of storing it in the fridge (would it rise over the top of the bowl? would the children uncover it?) but put it in an oiled ice cream bucket. I figured the lid would stay on! And it worked perfectly. A third of it makes a perfect loaf for supper for the four of us.
hi,
i have been researching raw and unprocessed foods, becuase i was making the transition on my own, but these recipes would help a lot. since this recipe uses flour and is baked, would that mean the recipe is not exactly unprocessed? fo you know if there is a way to make unprocessed bread?
By making it from scratch and whole organic ingredients you are eliminating many of the ingredients that come from store bought bread. And yes baking is a process, but I have not heard of a raw bread that does not require some sort of cooking or baking. We have a great post on grains for our Get Real series here http://onceamonthmom.com/get-r…
I’ve been considering this recipe, but am confused about the white flour. I would expect to see a whole grain flour used in a whole foods menu. I’ve made the whole wheat artisan breads from the 5 min. a day book, but those recipes call for an additional 1/4 cup of wheat gluten, which I’ve heard adding processed wheat gluten is not healthy, either. So which is ‘healthier’ – white flour artisan bread, or whole wheat with added gluten? (Or am I being completely anal about the whole thing?!) I’d love to keep using this method of baking if it’s not unhealthy for us.
This recipe is from the first artisan book, and yes there is a second follow up book showing you can make this with whole wheat flour but you do use vital wheat gluten to help it rise further. I use white whole wheat flour and it’s worked for this recipe several times without having to add vital wheat gluten.
I am trying this tonight with my own flour made from hard white wheat berries (truly 100% whole wheat). This is the same way I make my own whole wheat bread and it turns out great, so I am hoping to have success this route. Hard wheat has more gluten in it than soft wheat which you use for quick breads, cookies, etc. The whole wheat you buy at the store is inferior in quality than what you can grind yourself and always produces a thicker loaf.
White whole wheat sounds like the best of both worlds, I’ll try it!
I tried it with the white whole wheat and no wheat gluten, but the next morning the dough was very stiff. It cracked when I tried to form the loaf. Guess it only works with some brands of white whole wheat…What brand do you use?
Hmm I’m not sure Dawn. I can’t remember the brand since it was over a year ago that I bought the 50# bag. Ill do some digging and try to get back to you.
I checked this book out from the library, and have been baking bread for the past two weeks! It is VERY tasty bread, but mine have come out a bit dense, too. I’m baking on a pizza stone and following the directions for placing water in a broiler pan to generate steam. Has anyone made the basic boule recipe using bread flour? I am wondering if this makes a difference? I would be interested to hear how that has worked for others. I think this will be my next batch….I’m eager to move on to other recipes in the book, too!
I am usually pretty good at reading directions, but you lost me after cutting off the grapefruit size piece of dough. I’ve never made bread before and need a little bit of help with the rest of that step.
This is the first time I am making bread and it is not going so well.
My dough is SO STICKY. It’s like glue!!
Help! What can I do to salvage all this dough and not have to throw it away?!
Meredith I’d need to know what stage you are at. The dough is supposed to be sticky as it rises. You can always add more flour as it goes, but don’t add so much that it becomes dry to the touch.
(Please see above reply. I did not link my reply to yours, Kelly)
I was at the stage of the separating the bread into grapefruit sizes after the initial rise.
I think my problem lay at using such a big batch- yielding 8-10 loaves. I started again from the beginning and using the initial batch size- yielding 4 loaves. So far, so good! My dough is not nearly as sticky and had better ease separating the dough into the individual loaf size. I am preheating my oven now. I will let you know how it goes!
Thanks for responding.
Interesting! I’m not sure what would have caused that, but I will say sometimes depending on the air of the house I’ve had to add more flour.
I made this with the menu recipe cards and it was double the recipe here – is it too much flour that way? The dough is stickier than normal bread, but I had to knead in all the flour with my hands to get it all mixed in.
Michelle, how many were you cooking for?
Just saw this – coming back to find this bread recipe since I liked it so much. 🙂 I probably put in that I was cooking for 6 in the recipe cards, but I may have done 4 and then mixed it twice. Not sure, either way, the bread turned out fine. I made extra than what we would have normally needed for the recipes in the menu, because I knew we like bread with meals often.
Oh my god! This Artisan Bread recipe is amazing. My husband and kids love it. Thank you so much for sharing it with everyone. xx
By the way, you can cook this in a crockpot as well. I can’t pull up the link for you right now, but the book authors discuss it on their blog. You could google crockpot no-knead bread or something like that.
Can I bake this in a traditional loaf pan? I can still add the steam element to the baking time. The kids like toast and it would be helpful if it was a more traditional shape that fit in the toaster.
Yes – you certainly can. I would watch it closely though as cooking times may need to be adjusted. Let us know how it turns out!
How many loaves does this yield?
This will make one loaf, or you can choose to make it into two smaller loaves. Just watch your baking time if you make smaller loaves. If you set your serving size higher for your documents, the loaf (loaves) will be larger.