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Sundari Elizabeth Kraft is our urban homesteader. Sundari owns Heirloom Gardens LLC, a multi-plot urban farm in northwest
Denver that distributes its food through a Neighborhood Supported Agriculture program, at the local farmers market, and to
area restaurants. Sundari teaches classes in back yard chicken and goat care, small-space gardening, and canning. She is also
the author of The Complete Idiots Guide to Urban Homesteading. www.eatwhereUlive.com
is the key to making this bread work,
but theres a shortcut when youre in
a pinch. Just add 1 t red wine vinegar
to the water, and that will give you a
good rise within a 611 hour window
of time.
If you dont have counter space to
spare: While this bread doesnt require
kneading, the recipe does ask you to
fold the dough on a floured surface. If
space is tight, you can just sprinkle the
extra flour on the dough while its in
the mixing bowl, and use a spatula to
help scrape and fold the dough within
the bowl.
If you want to experiment with taste or
texture: The skys the limit! Feel free to
substitute any combination of grains or
seeds for the oats/flax/quinoa mixture
in this recipe (up to 1 cup total). Some
ideas include millet, sunflower seeds,
barley, or pumpkin seeds. You can
also try making a breakfast bread by
adding a cup of dried fruit (like raisins
or chopped dried apricots), upping the
sugar to 2 T, and adding t each of
spices like cinnamon and ginger.
homesteading
wi
Sundari
*
The city where I live has an abundance
of wonderful bakeries, each with a great
variety of crusty breads. What they
offer is delicious, but lets face itthis
artisanal bread is typically not cheap.
Plus, as an urban homesteader, I take
great joy in making things from scratch.
Puttering in the kitchen is one of my
simple pleasures.
However, my early attempts at baking
bread were anything but simple.
The loaves were often dry and
misshapennot to mention the hassle
of flour on every kitchen surface! All
that time spent kneading and rising
(and kneading and rising again) made
the less-than-stellar final product even
more disappointing.
All of that changed once I learned about
no-knead bread. Now I have a bread
recipe thats easy enough to allow for
regular baking, and so tasty that it gives
my popular neighborhood bakery a run
for their money. By following the bread-
making tricks outlined below, you can
produce a loaf with a crusty outside and
a chewy insidefor a small fraction of
the cost of an artisan loaf.
The recipe Im sharing was initially
inspired by Mark Bittmans No-Knead
Bread recipe in the New York Times,
but Ive made a significant number of
alterations to come up with a version
that has the look and taste that my
family enjoys. Ill give you some
suggestions for additional modifications
at the end of the recipe, and I hope that
youll have fun coming up with your
own variation!
But first, Ill share some of the basic
principles behind no-knead bread.
Time: The work normally done by
kneading is instead accomplished by a
long, slow rise, which allows the dough
to become wonderfully elastic.
Moisture: Youll notice that this
dough is much wetter than the bread
doughs you may be accustomed to.
Thats okaythe high moisture content
is needed to produce the steam.
Dutch oven: The secret to the
fantastic crusts on artisanal bread is
often a fancy steam-injected oven.
Duplicating this at home requires that
the bread be cooked in a Dutch oven
or a heavy covered pot (ceramic or
cast iron works best).
Dough to pot ratio: My
initial attempts at no-knead bread
yielded tasty loaves with a great
texture, but their shape was somewhat
flatter than what I was looking for. I
wanted bread that had enough height
to be sliced for sandwiches. Since the
no-knead bread dough is so wet, it
spreads and fills whatever pot you put it
in. A pot thats too large for the dough
yields a flat-ish loaf. So, Ive learned to
make a larger batch of dough for my big
pot, and halve the recipe when cooking
in my small pot.
Flour: Most bakers have a favorite
flour, and this recipe will work with all-
purpose or whole-wheat flour. However,
my favorite is whole-wheat pastry flour,
which gives you the nutrition of whole
wheat, but the lighter texture of white
flour.
Yeast: Most bread recipes call for
active dry yeast, but no-knead bread
uses instant yeast. You should be able
to find it in your grocery store in the
baking aisle.
This recipe makes a large loaf, and it
should be cooked in a large (around 6-
quart) Dutch oven or heavy covered pot.
No-Knead
Wholegrain Bread
6 cups flour, plus a little extra
cup oats
2 T flax seeds
cup quinoa
t instant yeast
2 t salt
1 T sugar
cornmeal as needed
1. In large bowl, combine 6 cups of
flour, oats, flax seeds, quinoa, yeast,
salt, and sugar.
2. Add 34 cups of water and stir until
blended. (The amount needed will vary,
depending on the type of flour used.
Start with 3 cups, and add more as
needed.) Dough should be shaggy (kind
of like a dogs fur) and sticky.
3. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest
for 1218 hours at room temperature
(6570F).
4. Preheat oven to 500F. Place
covered pot in oven as it heats.
5. While oven and pot are heating,
lightly flour a work surface and scrape
dough onto the floured area. Sprinkle
a bit of additional flour onto the dough
(just enough so that it wont stick to
your fingers) and fold the dough over
itself a couple of times. Cover with
plastic wrap and let rest until oven is
done heating.
6. Once the oven has reached 500F,
remove the pot and sprinkle cornmeal
in the bottom. Place the dough in the
pot and set the lid on top. Bake for 35
minutes with the lid on. Remove lid
and bake for an additional 10 minutes.
When the bread is done, remove it from
the pot and cool on a rack.
And, because no recipe is one-size-fits-
all
If you need a smaller loaf: Just cut
the recipe in half, and be sure to use
a smaller pot for cooking (a 3-quart
size works well). You will also need to
reduce the cooking time to 30 minutes
with the lid on, but still 10 minutes
with the lid off.
If you dont have 1218 hours to let
the dough rise: The long rise really
in the City Rising
IF THOU TASTEST A CRUST OF BREAD,
THOU TASTEST ALL THE STARS AND
ALL THE HEAVENS. Robert Browning

URBAN
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