No-Knead Bread with Flavored Butters

When I last talked to y'all I was wishing a Happy Birthday to my sister Grace.  Today, before I tell you about this yummy bread, I'd like to wish a Happy 30th Anniversary to my parents.  Congrats on a long life of love together!

Dad is actually the one who told me about this no-knead bread after a coworker of his brought some in to work.  I finally got around to making it over a week ago but I haven't had a chance to write about it because we had such a busy weekend!  Friday night we drove to north Kansas City to buy a dresser that I found on Craigslist (it will be on the blog eventually), then we went to a friends house for game night.  On Saturday we worked on the outside of our house in the morning, then I worked on that dresser for the rest of the afternoon.  Then we ended up going to a different friend's house on Saturday night for more games!  On Sunday I spent almost my ENTIRE day making 5 kinds of cupcakes, 4 kinds of fillings and 2 kinds of icings.  A friend from Rolla has asked me if I'd like to make her wedding cake this October so I made all those cupcake combinations so she and her fiance could choose which flavor then want for their cake.  

Aaaaanyway, I just didn't have time to write a blog post, but now I do.  So back to the bread at hand.  This bread really was delicious and super easy to make!  It took a long time, but most of that was just waiting for the dough to rise.  I decided that if this bread turned out good, then it would need some tasty butter to go with it.  I used things we already had at the house to make 2 types of flavored butter, basil garlic butter and honey almond butter.  Both were amazing!  Joe really loved the basil garlic butter, but I liked the almond honey butter.  Even if you don't make this bread, you should definitely try whipping up some flavored butter for muffins, biscuits, pancakes, grilled cheese or anything else you could possibly want to spread butter on :)

Here is the recipe for the bread.  The only special equipment you need is a large, cast iron dutch oven with a lid.  

No-Knead Bread

6 cups bread flour (recommended) or all purpose flour

1/2 t. instant or active-dry yeast

2 1/2 t. salt

2 2/3 cups cool water

1. In a large bowl, combine the flour, yeast and salt.  Add the water and stir until all the ingredients are well incorporated; the dough should be wet and sticky.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let the dough rest 12-18 hours on the counter at room temperature.  When the surface of the risen dough has darkened slightly, smells yeasty, and is dotted with bubbles, it is ready.

Wet and sticky dough.

How the dough looked after about 20 hours of rising.

2. Lightly flour your hands and a work surface.  Place the dough on the work surface and sprinkle with more flour.  Fold the dough over on itself once or twice and, using floured fingers, tuck the dough underneath to form a rough ball.

3.  GENEROUSLY dust a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with enough flour, cornmeal or wheat bran to prevent the dough from sticking to the towel as it rises.  Place the dough seam side down on the towel and dust with more flour.  Cover with the edges or with a second towel and let rise for 2 hours, until it has doubled in size.

Doubled in size.

4.  After about 1 1/2 hours, preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  Place a 6-8 quart dutch oven into the oven as it heats.  When the dough has risen fully, carefully remove the pot from the oven.  Remove the top towel from the dough and slide your hand under the bottom towel and flip the dough from the towel into the pot.

Trying to dump the dough into the pot.  But it was sticking...

Finally in the pot.

But this was left behind on the towel. :(  That's why I emphasized the GENEROUS in flouring the towel.

5.  Cover and bake for 40-50 minutes.  Uncover and continue baking for 5-10 minutes, until a deep chestnut brown.  The internal temp of the bread should be about 200 degrees.  You can check this with a meat thermometer if you want.

6.  Remove the bread from the pot and let it cool completely on a wire rack before slicing.

Mm mm mm

To make the butters you'll need a stick of butter for each flavor you want and whatever mix-ins you're planning on using.  I used the following things:

Garlic Basil Butter: 1 clove garlic (grated), 8 basil leaves (chopped), a pinch of salt

Honey Almond Butter:  Honey, slivered almonds (chopped), cinnamon, almond flavoring

I just threw in random amounts of ingredients for the honey butter, but it worked out ok :)

Once the bread is cool and butters are made, EAT, and reward yourself for waiting sooooo long for the dough to rise!  Another tasty way to eat this bread is to make a little plate of olive oil and spices to dip the bread in.

Well, this post ended up being longer than I intended, but thanks for sticking with it if you made it to the end, haha.  I hope you're all having a great week and let me know if you make this bread or any yummy butters :)