I have prepared aout 7 loaves so far with great results. I will try the cold oven method tomorrow, as well as the pre-heated pizza stone covered with an aluminum roasting pan… I also have reduced the second rise time to about 1 hour (after turning dough around the same bowl where it has risen for the first 12 hours or so) and then baking it with great results.

This really seems to be almost like a fool proof recipe! The other day I added green olives and saute onions in the second rise and it was excellent.

If you’re going to go with a cold Dutch oven, I wouldn’t bother to preheat the oven at all. It’s going to take a while to warm up all that cast iron, so, whatever benefit there is in the initial blast of heat with preheating, you’re giving that up. Quite a few people prefer to start cold, and they are happy with the results.

I did a head-to-head test with identical loaves, one started cold, the other with a preheated Dutch oven. The preheated loaf got a little more oven spring, but both worked fine.

to answer your quest about covering the dough directly on the hot stone. Try a foil roasting pan. They come in a variety of sizes and depths and are available everywhere. Supermarkets, dollar stores etc. all have them. I suggest the deep steam table pans.
They are so thin and heat conductive that they heat up almost instantly in the hot oven and eliminate the need to preheat them. This make them easier to handle.

Since my husband wasn’t with me when I found the knob at Home Depot, I took along the Le Creuset knob and screw to help find a suitable replacement and approached a store employee and for help to find a solid brass knob and the right screw size.

I have made the bread in both Le Creuset and Corning bakeware containers and much prefer the results from The Le Creuset. I don’t get as crisp a crust from the Corning containers (my hunch is because the glass cover doesn’t seal as well, allowing moisture to more easily escape than with the Le Creuset pots). I also prefer using the smallest possible container so the 2-1/2 hour rise forces the bread up rather than out. After baking, the crust is evenly browned on all sides.

Specific pot sizes I’ve used are:
#22 (3-1/2 qt.) round Le Creuset. Raised dough filled the bottom of the pot and touched sides somewhat with a gently rounded crown. Crust perfectly browned/crunchy all around and crumb beautifully open and airy.

#23 (2-3/4 qt.) oval Le Creuset. Raised dough filled the oval container with a rounded crown about an 2 inches from the top. Crust perfectly browned/crunchy all around and crumb beautifully open and airy.

#18 (2 qt.) Le Creuset. Raised dough filled the pot completely with rounded crown within a 1/2 inch of the top. This bread definitely touched the lid as it was baking. Crust perfectly browned/crunchy and crumb didn’t seem to be compromised by the more compact baking vessel at all.

You know, I’ve never timed how long the cold-oven method takes versus pre-heating. In my oven (Dacor brand) with a pure-convection setting it takes longer to get to temperature than if I use a regular bake setting but I’ve never timed or compared hot to cold methods through to the finished product.

What other beers have you tried? My last batch used Fat Tire and the bread aroma and flavor was far superior than using Coors.

Isn’t it fun messing around with these recipes and techniques?

I have a few questions about your innovations and experiments.

First, how did you find the right screws for your metal knob replacements? When I got my Le Creuset, I stopped by Home Depot, myself. All the knobs I found came with screws that were way too long for the Dutch oven lid, and they were a different gauge and thread size from the one on my lid. I couldn’t find any shorter screws in the hardware department that fit the knobs. How did you solve that problem?

Second, I have been using a larger Dutch oven than you, on the assumption that I don’t want the dough to touch the sides of the cooking container (maybe not a good assumption?), and I have been removing the bread completely from the Dutch oven for the final browning. I find that if I don’t, I don’t get the great crust on the sides of the loaf. You are letting your dough fill the container. Do you still get good crust on the sides?

Third, how do you figure you are saving money with the cold start? I did my own experiment comparing cold vs. hot start. You can see my results over at http://www.breadtopia.com/basic-no-knead-method/#comment-32056. I was primarily testing which gave better oven spring, because proponents of both methods had cited better oven spring as an advantage of their approach. But I found I had the oven on almost as long with the cold start. That loaf took a total of 56 minutes, the other took 35, plus preheating. Now, that is a savings of nine minutes for the cold start, but I’ll bet I could cut down my preheating time a bit, If I’m willing to actually measure how long the oven takes to come up to temperature. And nine minutes isn’t much savings. Of course, different ovens perform differently.

Please don’t take my comments as criticisms of your approach or ideas. I’m new to all this, and am just trying to figure out the basics, and to understand what principles apply. I like to experiment, and I really enjoy conversing with others who do, too. When our results differ, I’m driven to try to find out why.

Oh, and I completely agree with you on the use of better beers for better bread.

• Mix ingredients and let rest for 18 hours, and knead as directed.
• Line a 3 quart enamel cast iron pot (I’ve replaced my Le Creuset knobs with metal ones from Home Depot. Easy and cheap) with parchment paper and put post-kneaded, formed dough ball into pot. Cover and let rise in a warm place for 2 1/2 hours.
The trick is to not rush the rising time. In my 3-quart pot, the dough almost rises to the top – not quite touching the lid before I slash it. For the 2 1/2 hour rise time, I typically put the covered pot in my COLD oven with the oven light turned on. This smaller pan restricts the dough sides and force the dough to rise upward rather than outward.
• After it’s sufficiently risen, remove pot cover, slash dough as directed in the recipe, recover the pot and place in a COLD oven.
• Turn on the oven to 450 degrees and bake covered for 30 minutes, then uncovered for as long as it takes for the bread to get to an internal temperature of 210 degrees (I use a remote food thermometer) to take the guess work out of determining doneness.

I get the same tall, crusty but tender crumb results as doing the exact same steps using a pre-heated oven. The only difference is I’m saving a bunch of energy starting with a cold oven.

I’ve also experimented with different beers. The heftier lagers definitely impart a stronger yeasty smell and flavor – something my family prefers to the bread using a light lager as recommended in the original recipe.