Why Bake Bread In A Dutch Oven ~
- Baking bread in a covered Dutch oven traps the moisture from the dough as it cooks, allowing the bread to steam for the first part of baking. This keeps the crust softer longer and encourages a higher rise.
- Youll remove the cover toward the end of the baking time, which is when the bread will form its crusty top.
- The shape of the Dutch oven supports the bread so that its nice and round and doesnt flatten out like it can if you baked it on a baking sheet.
What Is Gluten Free Artisan Bread
Do you want my definition or the real definition?
Mine- any crusty loaf of bread that makes you feel fancy af for baking it yourself.
Real- A term that is vague in meaning but refers to a short shelf life bread usually offered unpackaged.
We have both of those here for you today. A super thick crusty bread that you can place in a basket and serve to your family. Yet, you also feel so freaking amazing about your baking abilities you can’t even stand it.
Gluten Free Artisan Bread In A Dutch Oven
Gluten free artisan bread aka gluten free dutch oven bread aka bread that is going to make you feel like you are the most amazing baker in the entire world.
That is the number of tries it took to get this recipe the way I dreamed it could be. And I dreamed it could be just like the real deal gluten filled version.
I knew deep down I could do it. Should I be embarrassed it took so many tries?
I don’t think so. I am actually super proud, because it was freaking hard. Gluten free bread baking is no joke.
But I also had all these special requirements. I didn’t want to use some crazy flour blend that required you to buy 13975 flours. I also didn’t want to wait for it to rise.
And I did it!
When testing, each attempt came out gluey on the inside. Until one day I decided to add more things in it to help it rise and have more air pockets. That day I left the house with the bread in the oven and my husband in charge.
Well he forgot about it. And it burned slightly and he had no idea how long it was in the oven. Despite the burned exterior, the texture on the inside was perfect! So I knew I was one more bake away from giving you a gluten free bread you can make in under an hour.
So here we are today friends. I have stand before you with an amazing gluten free bread that you are going to want to make again and again!
Read Also: Best Way To Store Bread For Freshness
Insulate With A Baking Sheet Or Baking Stone
Most ovens have a bottom heating element that can provide far too much heat on the bottom of your dough, especially if you place the rack too close. Using an insulator, such as a baking sheet/Baking Steel/baking stone, can provide some thermal mass between the heating element and your dough. This blocker will help insulate your dough when the heating element kicks on to provide a more even heat.
Place a rack on the very bottom of your oven and then place another one or two rungs up above that. On the bottom rack, place your baking sheet/Baking Steel/baking stone. Then, use the rack just above this to hold your Dutch oven when baking.
How To Make Dutch Oven Bread:
Prep: Line a work surface with parchment paper and trim corners from the paper to create a round-ish shape to fit better in the dutch oven. Sprinkle the center 9 of parchment with 1 Tbsp cornmeal, semolina or flour and set aside. Note: Using cornmeal or semolina creates a nice crunch to the crust.
Read Also: How Fast Do Cherry Shrimp Breed
Why A Dutch Oven For This Bread
The empty pan is heated to a high temperature in the oven for at least a half hour before you even put the dough inside. How hot? Were talking about 450°F and thats pretty smokin hot, too hot for most pans or dishes. A cast iron pot can take the heat without any problem.
In addition, a Dutch oven has a heavy lid which seals in moisture, and again, its made out of cast iron which can take the heat. A lid is essential for the success of this bread recipe.
If you dont have a cast iron Dutch oven yet, I would recommend getting one. I use mine often. Its a great all-purpose pan, perfect for simmering because it holds the heat so well.
To Sourdough Or Not To Sourdough
Anyhow, a little background, this past holiday, while visiting friends and family back east, I was gifted a bit of sourdough starter from a friend of a friend. She lovingly put it into a sealed jar, wrapped it in plastic wrap, and popped it into a resealable plastic bag. I tucked that into my luggage and off I went. As an aside, and in full disclosure, I previously bought two different OLD starters from Fermentation on Wheels Tara Whitsitt several years ago when she came to Des Moines and taught a fermentation class at a local community garden. Unfortunately, even though I originally hail from San Francisco and sourdough is something my family has always loved, I dont seem to be adult enough to care for a starter they require some attention, which is probably one of the reasons why sourdough bread is so popular right now, people are spending more time at home, and have the time to tend their starters, and because home-baked bread is so good and comforting and we can all use a bit of that these days.
However, that doesnt mean home baked bread, with an open, chewy crumb and crackled crust is, or was, going to elude me, and it doesnt have to elude you, either. What did I do? I turned to two recipes I previously developed No-Knead Whole-Wheat Bread and No-Knead Cinnamon-Raisin Bread. It was just what I wanted incredibly good bread thats incredibly easy to make.
Don’t Miss: Iams Large Breed Lamb And Rice
Helpful Tips For Perfect Dutch Oven Bread:
- When the bread is out of the oven, put the empty dutch oven back in the oven to cool down as it will be blazing hot to the touch. My dad lifted the lid to see what was inside before I could warn him Ouch!!
- No dutch oven? No problem! Follow the baking instructions in our Original No-Knead Breadrecipe.
- NEVER slice into hot bread or it will release steam and become gummy. Dutch oven bread will taste best if you let it rest and cool.
Reduce Oven Temperature For Preheating And Baking
The first approach is to modify your baking temperatures. If you find the bottom colors too quickly and either burns or becomes too thick, reduce the preheat temperature. For example, some of my recipes here call for a 45 minute to 1 hour preheat at 450°F , you could drop this down to 425°F for the preheat.
Baking times and temperatures will be discussed in depth later in this post, but you can continue to adjust the temperature down until you find the bottom of your loaves bake just enough without burning.
Don’t Miss: Is Subway’s Bread Vegan
How To Make It
Remember, the detailed, printable directions for baking Dutch oven bread are on the recipe card below!
First, stir together all of the ingredients in a large bowl to form a loose dough.
Grease the dough a bit, cover it tightly with plastic wrap, and set it aside overnight, twelve to eighteen hours.
The dough will g-r-o-w in size until its nearly doubled.
When youre ready to bake, get your Dutch oven with the lid heating up in the oven. This will take at least a half hour.
While the oven is heating, remove the dough from the bowl and put it on a floured surface. Dont be afraid to add a fair amount of flour to the counter, your hands, the top of the dough, etc. Use a dough scraper if you have one. Fold the dough over a few times, forming a dough ball. Youre not kneading the dough, rather, youre shaping it. It should only take a minute or so.
Place the dough on a wide strip of parchment paper and reshape it if necessary. It does NOT have to be a perfect ball. Cover it and let it rise until the oven is hot.
When the Dutch oven is good and hot, carefully remove it from the oven. Please, please be careful! Using an oven mitt, remove the lid from the pan and set it aside. Uncover the dough, and grabbing the corners of the parchment paper, transfer the paper and dough ball to the Dutch oven, just nestling it right in there, paper and all.
Dont care if its in decent slices? Ha, neither do I! Nibble away! Dont forget the butter and honey.
What Goes Into Dutch Oven Bread
The beauty of this quick dutch oven bread is that most of the ingredients are pantry staples. All you need is bread flour, honey, salt, and yeast adding seeds to the mix creates a beautiful loaf with minimal effort. My parents were mighty impressed with this dutch oven bread and kept raving about it, which is a really big deal because Mom literally makes the best bread ever!
Also Check: Burbon Sauce For Bread Pudding
A Deeply Colored Shiny Crust
There’s little as elegant as a crust that’s well-colored with a gradient from almost-white to a deep mahagony the contrast is striking. Add to this a subtle catch of light and shininess: your mouth starts watering even before the intoxicating smell hits you.
As we discussed earlier, steam inside the closed environment of the Dutch oven settles on the outside of the dough, forming a thin layer that prevents the temperature from reaching too high too fast. This helps you ensure the exterior of your loaf doesn’t darken before you finish baking the interior.
Additionally, as Jeffrey Hamelman states in his book BREAD, the reduced temperature on the exterior of the loaf allows the enzymatic activity to continue for longer. This activity, which is the same activity that’s been happening throughout the entire fermentation process, continues to unlock sugars which add to crust coloring during baking.
A well-steamed oven also promotes gelatinization2: in the presence of heat starch molecules on the exterior of the dough begin to absorb available moisture , start to swell, and eventually pop to form a thin liquid layer . This layer finally bakes hard and becomes a thin and crispy exterior with a subtle shine.
With all these benefits it seems like baking in a sealed pot is a no brainer. However, there are some issues with the method, the biggest being a thicker, and possibly burned bottom. Let’s take a look at a few ways to help mitigate this issue.
Artisan Bread Starts Low And Slow
Customer feedback is highly regarded at King Arthur Flour really, it is. Suggestions arent brushed to the wayside but taken seriously. When new questions are posed, we put our baking brains to work finding the answer. So when readers began asking about bread baking in a cold Dutch oven, we started plotting. This topic deserves a full-on investigation!
In our initial exploration of bread baking in a Dutch oven, we investigated using a preheated pot to bake no-knead bread. The results of this method were impressive loaves baked to crisp, crusty, golden-brown perfection.
Here are loaves made in a preheated pot with those baked on a sheet pan . The side-by-side comparison is stark.
So if youve got a bread baking crock that can be preheated empty , its certainly worth trying this method. But what about all the other Dutch ovens that cant be preheated empty, for fear of damage?
This is when you might want to consider baking in a cold Dutch oven the oven isn’t cold the entire time, of course, but just at the start. Putting the pot into a cold oven allows it to warm slowly as the oven heats up. It prevents any sort of thermal damage that might occur to the pot if it’s heated empty.
Baking in a cold Dutch oven: how it works
Start by preparing your dough as instructed in the recipe.
The result? A decent loaf of homemade bread!
How baking in a cold Dutch oven compares
There’s only one way to find out!
And look what happens!
Also Check: Recipe For Gluten Free Bread
Foolproof Bread In A Pot Recipe
March 27, 2020 by
As we all start to adjust to the limitations of our new stay at home routine, one thing that I have noticed is a sharp rise in the number of you requesting more information on bread making. For me, bread is therapy. The mixing, the forming, the baking, and finally, the sampling of a warm slice slathered in butter, are all so satisfying! So, it almost goes without saying that I am so glad that more and more of you are trying your hand at this wonderful and rewarding part of baking.
If you have never attempted baking a loaf of bread before, this bread in a pot recipe is for you. If you are a confident baker and just want to have a fresh bread for dinner tonight without fussing too much about it, this recipe is for you too! I scaled my recipe for the rustic Easy no-knead bread from a few years back and simplified it even more, so you now can make a smaller loaf.
Three ingredients are all you need for this easy bread recipe: all-purpose flour, yeast, and salt. Most important, there is no kneading required, so, really, there is no excuse not to attempt making this bread this weekend.
Step by Step photos:
Foolproof Bread in a Pot
Delicious Seeded Breads Have Never Been Easier
We love seeded breads for their extra texture and added flavor and this bundle has all the essentials to turn your favorite loaves into seeded!
Bundle includes our Emile Henry Dutch Oven for your crispiest crust, our High Gluten Flour for extra chew and a higher rise , and our Everything Bagel Topping for a savory crunch.
Bundle includes a printed recipe to get you started, but the sky is the limit on how you choose to personalize!
Read Also: Best Oven For Baking Bread
How To Make Artisan Sourdough Bread
If you havent experienced the joy of homemade sourdough bread, you havent truly lived.
Making a delicious loaf of sourdough bread is more attainable than you may think!
Makes 2 loaves.
From Erica Kastner of Buttered Side Up.
weight sourdough starter that passes the float test
unrefined sea salt