No Knead Four Grain Bread
To keep the crisp, good crust, wrap the bread in a clean tea towel or paper bag after it has cooled and store the bread in it. Several people have asked me if this bread can be frozen. I haven’t tried it myself, but I’m sure it can. You will lose the crispy crust then, but if you heat the bread in a hot air oven you will get a crispy crust back (but it must be eaten immediately).
Ingredients
-
400g high grade (or plain) white flour
-
200g wholemeal flour
-
50g toasted pumpkin seeds
-
50g toasted sunflower seeds
-
25g linseeds
-
25g sesame seeds
-
1/4tsp dry yiest
-
1.5tsp coarse salt
-
1/2tsp honey
-
500ml water at room temperature
Directions
-
Roast the sunflower and pumpkin seeds in a dry frying pan at medium heat for 5-10 minutes until they brown a little. Optionally add the linseeds and sesame seeds near the end. Put aside 1/3 of the toasted seeds for later.
-
Add the remaining seeds and the other dry ingredients to a baking bowl and mix well.
-
Dissolve the honey in some warm water. Add the room-temperature water and stir the dough quickly with a ladle or similar. The dough should be quite sticky, but not be runny. Cover with a lid or cling film and allow the dough to rise at room temperature overnight, about 10-20 hours.
-
Sprinkle some flour over the dough. The dough will now go through a “folding process”. Find a spatula or similar and “fold” the flap of dough (facing you) towards the middle. Rotate the bowl 90 degrees and fold the dough over again, the same way you fold an envelope. Repeat the folding process a few more times and sprinkle with seeds and a little flour until all sides are covered in seeds.
-
Sprinkle some flour at the bottom of the bowl and set down the dough with the “folding seam” down. Cover again with clong film or lid. Leave the bread to rest for about 2 hours. Half an hour before you bake the bread, set the oven to 250C degrees and at the same time insert the dutch oven (with lid) in which you are going to bake the bread. The dutch oven I used here is 24cm in diameter. My experience is that the bread will be the best in a dutch oven, but if you do not have one, you can use other types of tempered dishes with a lid, or possibly cover the dish with double-layered aluminum foil.
-
When the second raising is done, gently “flip” the dough from the baking bowl into the hot pan. It’s fine if the dough sticks to the bowl, use a knife or similar to free it. If necessary, gently shake the pot to even out the dough. Put on the lid and bake on the bottom tray for about 30 minutes. Remove the lid and bake for 5-15 minutes, until the bread is golden and nice. You can check if the bread is done by knocking on its base. It has a “hollow” sound when it is finished. Allow the bread to cool on a rack.
Category: Baking