I’ve been baking regularly since February and made probably 15+ batches since then.
Tried making a no knead bread last weekend, turned out okay but didn't rise enough.
I've gotten annoyed with kneading so I've taken to substituting it with time. I'll just knead the dough so it's basically homogenous, and then I'll let it alone for a few days. Instead of forcing gluten development by hand, just let that shit grow on its own in its own time.
You can do this for at least a week and the dough will only start to show signs of going sourdough on the seventh.
I think part of the issue was I don't think I combined the ingredients well enough. I panicked a bit when the dough stuck all to my hands and I don't think I finished convinced them properly.
I'm gonna give it another shot this weekend.
Depending on what kind of bread you're making, I've really started liking adding like a tablespoon of olive oil towards the end. It's amazing how it stops the dough from sticking to either your hands or the bowl.
There's a good technique in Flour, Water, Yeast, Salt where you essentially pull the dough up over itself from five or six points and then you flip it over on itself. You do that and let it rest for twenty minutes to a half hour. Do it a few times instead of kneading. It's all about developing gluten from the water flour combination by making longer strands.
I think I might have done what you're describing? I stuck pretty close to the recipe Kenji Lopez-Alt posted on youtube (I love his channel of you haven't heard of him). So i combined ingredients, covered with plastic wrap and left it for 24 hours, then gave it a few turns and left it for another hour, then tucked it into the loaf shape (I think this is the part you're describing, 9:00 or so in the video) covered it with a towel and left it for another hour, and then finally baked it.
Because I'm a lazy bitch and I've got this process down pat, I only bake no-knead bread.
For me, flat bread has been caused by
- excessive bulk fermentation due to high kitchen temps (the higher the ambient temperature the less bulk fermentation time given)
- too much salt. I don't weigh my ingredients like I should but the rule of thumb is that there should be 1/2 tsp salt per 1 cup flour. This particular recipe is 4 cups flour but I only use 1.5 tsp total salt.
Also, I've used different yeasts but only the "active dry yeast" kind available most everywhere and because of COVID shortages, this particular recipe allowed me to stretch out what I had since it only needs 1/2 tsp per batch. I recommend King Arthur Bread Flour as well.
I definitely added too much salt. I was trying for 10 grams but I was out of regular granulated salt so I tried to measure that much out in the coarse kosher salt I had on hand and grind it in the mortar and pestle, and ended up with I think 14 grams? So that's probably part of it, along not homogenizing it very well like princessmagnificent mentioned.
In bakers percentages ~2% salt always seems to be the sweet spot where it's enough to help the gluten develop without compromising your yeast.
Love homemade bread. So easy and cheap. This past week I made challah and pita that both turned out great
I'm fulltime working from home so it breaks up the day when I have something to look forward to
That's a beautiful loaf, with some crunchy-looking crust :zizek-joy:
