Homemade bread is one of the most delicious things to eat. Fresh and warm from the oven with butter and steam! My mouth is watering just thinking about it! So last Sunday, my mother sent a message to me, my sister and my sister in law a link to a youtube channel. On this channel it happened to be a family member of ours posting a "visual recipe book" of sorts. She has traveled to France to take workshops and lessons with incredible chefs and has shared her knowledge with us! So we all decided we would make her Rustic Bread on Sunday and share our outcomes.
It was FAST, delicious and DAIRY FREE! My sweet girl, Melody, cannot have dairy due to behavioral allergies she seems to have inherited from her Father. I will get more into that in a later post. So BAKING something that she can have is always exciting for all of us! I am going to post my written version of her verbal recipe, my pictures of my process and the results! At the end I will include a link to her video so you can follow along! All in all, this recipe took me about 1.5 hours start to finish.... including rise time!
5 Ingredient RUSTIC BREAD
What you need to have on hand
measuring cups and spoons
A large mixing bowl
Cooking Spray
PARCHMENT paper
plastic wrap or a light hand towel
A fully metal pot and lid (must be able to withstand the heat of the oven)
Olive Oil (or butter... in my case I used a plant butter)
Coarse salt
The Ingredients (flour, water, yeast, sugar and salt)
If you want to decrease rise time you can preheat your oven to its generic temperature and once it reaches temp, turn it off. This will create a warm rising space for your dough.
We need
4 c Flour (some extra on hand)
2 Tbsp of White Sugar
1Tbsp of good quality Yeast
1 Tsp of Salt
2 c of Water
Step 1: Proof your yeast. This means mix your sugar, salt and yeast in 2/3 c of warm water. Once mixed, set it aside for 5 minutes. When you come back to it, the yeast should look larger and move around a little in the water (not like swim), it should be "active". This will tell you that your yeast is active and ready to go!
Step 2: Mix your proofed Yeast into 4 C of quality all purpose flour. Add the remaining 2/3 C ofWarm Water. You can mix this with a rubber spatula, but I prefer to blend and mix with my hands.... (Just be sure to wash them and remove any rings you may be wearing ;)....) Turn out and flip the dough. Sprinkle any flour needed until it becomes a ball like form. It will be lumpy and that's okay!
Step 3:
Grease a bowl with your cooking spray and set the dough in the bowl. Cover with plastic
wrap (or towel if you don't have any plastic wrap), and let rise for 3-5 hours.... Rise time can depend on a few things. The temperature in your house, the altitude you reside in and the health of your yeast. Remember how I said my dough raised in record time? I preheated my oven and mine was ready to bake in about 30 min... So.... I was ready to wait the full 3 hours, but my yeast was feisty! It was ALIVE! So timing is not exact, it will depend on your circumstances... Plan for at least 3 hours but watch it and be prepared for faster or slower rise times.
Step 4:
When your dough has risen 3x in volume, Preheat your oven to 425 degrees! Place your metal pot in the oven as it preheats. Flour a clean surface and turn out your dough. knead it lightly and flour it until it forms a soft and smooth round ball of dough.
Step 5:
Put your round dough ball on a piece of parchment paper and carefully place it in your HOT pot from the oven. Put a lid on it and bake it for 30 min! Uncover it for 3-10 minutes until it is to your desired gold or browned top. Remove from oven and pot. Spread oil or butter over top crust and sprinkle with coarse salt. Let cook completely before eating. If any remains next day, it tastes best toasted.
There you have it!
5 ingredients, 5 steps to a delicious RUSTIC Bread!
Side note- Use as big a pot as you can... Not tall, but circumference. It will make a prettier finish. ALSO! I didn't wait to cut into mine... I'm a sucker for fresh bread! But OH MY GOSH! It was so good... and SO EASY! It took me an hour and a half MAYBE from start to eating! My husband and I devoured 1/2 of it pretty fast! The butter and salted top is to die for! YUMMMMMMM! I did test out just warming it in the microwave the next day, and it wasn't that great. It was fine, but the toasted piece was much better! Give it a shot! Follow the video HERE and enjoy your own Rustic Bread. Why? Because mama, YOU are worth it! Rise with your dough and together we will gain 4 lbs in carbs! It will be worth it ;). Share your pics of your attempts in the comments! I want to see them all!
