No Knead Bread Baking Method
On this page, you will find both the short and long version videos of a basic no knead bread baking technique. See these variations of no knead recipe too.
Before we get started, I wanted to share an email I received from Leanna who says more for the benefits of the no knead method than I could ever convey. She says…
Love This Method
I’ve been baking bread for 40 years and this method has turned my bread baking upside down. I even had kneading down to an art. My dough had to feel just right. My ingredients had to be the best. Now I just throw these four items into a bowl and with no effort on my part, I end up with perfection. I take care of a lady with handicaps and bake it for her too. She has a gas oven and mine at home is electric. I have had no problems with this method. I used to have a sourdough starter but several moves ago, I discarded it. Now with your starter I am back in business. I can hardly wait for my first loaf of NK sourdough bread.
6 min. 40 sec.
12 min. long
Ingredients for basic yeasted No Knead Method:
3 cups bread flour (the above video used 1 cup (5 oz.) whole wheat flour and 2 cups (10 1/2 oz.) white bread flour
1/4 tsp. instant yeast
1 1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 cups purified or spring water
- Mix together the dry ingredients.
- Mix in water until the water is incorporated.
- Cover with plastic and let sit 18 hours.
- Follow video instruction for folding.
- Cover loosely with plastic and rest for 15 minutes.
- Transfer to well floured towel or proofing basket. Cover with towel and let rise about 1 1/2 hours.
- Bake in covered La Cloche or Dutch oven preheated to 500 degrees for 30 minutes.
- Remove cover; reduce heat to 450 degrees and bake an additional 15 minutes.
- Let cool completely on rack.
- Consume bread, be happy.
Further notes: This method of baking is quite forgiving if you alter the ingredients and proportions. One of the great things about a bread recipe that is so easy and involves just one loaf at a time is you don’t feel like you’re risking a lot if your experimenting goes awry.
Try using different flours and/or different proportions of flour and play around with the water measurement a little.
I’ll be posting more videos and recipes on some of my favorite variations of this basic formula over the next few weeks.
I would love to hear from anyone with their experiences using this technique, both successful and otherwise. Please share your experiences below.
Note: Here are some great dough handling tips from Breadtopia reader Mark Liptak. Also, check out these no knead baking techniques by Margaret Ball.
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Darn you Breadtopia. Since I started making KNB and following your recipes I am totally addicted to the stuff and have gained five pounds. Thanks a lot.
Hi Vajra,
Thanks for the compliment. Wow, you must have gone back deep into the thread to find that. I still use 1/2 cup of Kefir in my bread making. It sounds like you are getting good results using just Kefir as your starter. Maybe you can catch us up on the proofing times and characteristics of your bread using just Kefir.
Wil
Wil, Your sourdough cranberry bread is gorgeous! I wish I’d had luck with sourdough starter, but after several failed attempts, I just use kefir as we discussed earlier. As I type this, I have another loaf of nk whole wheat bread in the oven.
I don’t remember if I touted this before, but the Emile Henry Flame Top Dutch Oven is da bomb. Entirely made of clay, it goes into a 500℉ without a care, and it is much lighter than any cast iron pot. I also purchased a stainless steel handle for my Le Creuset pots, just “in case.”
But despite assurances from Le Creuset I wouldn’t heat them at 500℉.
Thanks to those who’ve tried to discover why the French baker made the claims she did re bad health consequences of no-knead bread consumption. FYI, it’s ‘la vache’ (feminine noun) so cannot be ‘du vache’ (‘du’ being the combination of ‘de’ + ‘le’ with ‘le’ being the definite article of a masculine noun). Also, when the French say their equivalent of “It’s cow s…” they omit the cow altogether and simply say “C’est de la m…”.
Click here to translate C’est merde du vache.
Thanks Mark!
Mark
I never laughed so hard in all my life!
Re: health benefits of kneading: C’est merde du vache!
Wow…. I imagine that the physical process of kneading the dough has health benefits to the person doing the kneading.
For what it is worth, I have read on this site of health benefits of sourdough vs commercial yeast breads regarding the way the body absorbs carbs and sugars benefiting diabetics. I have no doubt there is some theory regarding the knead/no-knead claim, although the baker might just be deterring customers from home baking for obvious reasons.
A scientific explanation of molecules binding at an atomic level in hand kneaded bread would be interesting reading but isn’t going to stop me from making NKB.
Hi Toad,
I am not expert on that, but if you search through this site for the link to the Julia Child episode where she has a guest do a kneading demonstration, you will quickly understand how seariously the French take their bread making. The woman on the episode says she has to work/knead her dough 800 times (yes 800). She also mentions something about French law stating that you have to let the freshly baked bread sit a certain length of time before cutting into it. So I am not surprised that you got that reaction.
I have not heard anything negative about the no-knead method. I will watch for other member comments. Could be just another “French Law”.
Marianne
I DO NOT want to open a can of worms but have a question about kneading vs. no-kneading re health. This morning I bought artisan bread from an organic, well-known and highly respected bakery here in France. I mentioned to the baker that the loaves were a friend’s birthday present, and that I would have made her bread myself but hadn’t planned enough in advance and ran out of time. She was surprised I make bread myself and we got talking. I mentioned experimenting with the no-knead method and she launched into a scientific explanation of the reasons why one must ABSOLUTELY knead a min. of 20 to 30 minutes to develop the gluten (in the only safe health-wise way it can be done), otherwise there are acids? enzymes? that remain in the no-knead bread that when consumed prevent our instestines from functioning correctly and then toxins enter our blood stream, etc. etc. (This was all in French and other customers began arriving, so we got interrupted and I was surprised anyway so can’t quote her and left a little confused and now would like confirmation or rebuttals regarding her claims–and internet searches have got me no where so far…) Thanks in advance for any informed responses!
Thank you both for your comments. I am using instant dried yeast and tend to think it may be the temperature of the oven (which I check). As it is sporadic it is hard to know what the cause is.
Sara Anne,
Is your oven temp as hot as you may think it is? Maybe check it. Aslo, what kind of yeast are you using, sourdough, instant or yeast cake? Yeast cake, I understand has the potential for the problem your having.
Wil
Sara-Anne, I’m not sure about the problem you have but generally, I’m not satisfied with the crumb when I use anything other than white flour. I only use maybe 1/2 a cup of any whole grain/wheat and the crumb is so dense. I know whole grains do not have the gluten that white flours have but for the amount I use, IMO, it should not be that much of a change. I might just stick with white flour. Any comments?
May I change the thread for a moment. Occasionally, when baking a whole wheat loaf with a denser crumb I find a wet spot in the centre of the loaf.
The rest of the loaf is perfectly baked – it could not really bake longer. Replacing it in the oven does nothing to help. Is this a proofing problem?
NKB using the one bowl method. No messy counter or extra flour used.
Mix in the SS bowl. I use cold filtered water from our refrigerator.
Let it rise 18 hours.
Turn over in the SS bowl with spatula 10 or 12 times.
Let it rise the second time in the SS bowl in warm oven.
Take out of oven and turn oven to 450. My oven runs hot.
Place Pyrex bowl (with a little Pam) and cover in oven for 1/2 hour.
Dump dough from SS bowl into Pyrex bowl.
Cook for 1/2 hour covered. 5 minutes uncovered.
Check to see if temp is 210 Degrees F.
Dump out on cooling rack.
*Click to enlarge
To Joe,
gary,
i have thought of using the same bowl for the second rise. what always stopped me was i thought the dough would stick to the bowl. did you have that problem?
joe
Joe,
The dough does stick to the bowl, but I just scrape most of it into the bowl with my spatula. This is the messiest step left in the procedure as I am doing this wearing oven mitts. But is still is better than the other method.
Gary
Hi All,
Marsha, I actually do one of 2 things with dough/bread and both work. I learned that you can refrigerate the dough so I make a double batch, bake a loaf of bread and put the other half in the fridge to use within a few days. That would be doubling the recipe with 6 cups of flour. The other is I bake a large loaf, 4 cups of flour, and bake a loaf. The same day I freeze half the loaf for another time. I make a variety of breads as the boule, ciabatta, baguette, sandwich bread so I have to do this. I purchased a small freezer to accommodate this and my trips to Costco……lol.
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