I often find that, after coming home from a long trip, I want to start making a few really basic things: stock and a subsequent big batch of soup, a fresh batch of salts and toasted spices, and . . . bread. Somehow it’s important to fill the house with aromas to really let me know that I’m back.
I’ve been rather smitten with a somewhat recent cookbook purchase called Artisan Breads in Five Minutes a Day, by Hertzberg and Francois. The title refers not to the total time required to make a loaf of bread, of course; it refers to the really wonderful “nudge” of making a big batch homemade dough, refrigerating it, and slicing off a pound here and there to shape and bake whenever the fancy strikes. Once the initial labor of making the dough, letting it rise, punching it down, etc. is accomplished, great fresh bread is a short step away. It works. And the main reason it works is that pre-mixed, pre-risen, high-moisture dough keeps in the fridge for a long time. As a bonus, it’s no-knead, the yeast doesn’t need to be proofed, and you don’t need a starter or sponge. It’s about as low-fuss as it’s possible to be, yet it yields fantastic results. My kind of project!
I don’t always have bread dough in the fridge, of course; I still buy plenty of La Brea whole grain, Tartine country loaf, Brickmaiden wheat, and anything from Della Fatoria. But if I’m in the kitchen with a few extra moments and a small surplus of energy, I make an effort to whip up a quick five-pound batch of dough. It’s really not hard at all.
My favorite bread so far in the book is the broa, or Portuguese corn bread. It has a supercrunchy exterior, yet the interior is chewy and really corny. It makes brilliant toast.
It’s rare that I bother to write out exact instructions for a dish, but since bread is notoriously hard to wing, here it is, with a few minor adjustments that have improved it for me. I don’t think Hertzberg and Francois will mind. Give it a try.
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Broa (Portuguese Corn Bread)
Makes two two-pound loaves, or four one-pound loaves. The recipe is easily doubled.
- 3 cups lukewarm water
- 1.5 tablespoons granulated yeast (1.5 packets; I buy mine in bulk from the local hippie store, and just keep it in a jar in the fridge)
- 1.5 tablespoons kosher salt
- 1.5 cups stoneground cornmeal (I use fancy-ish polenta, medium grind, but regular old cornmeal probably works fine)
- 5 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (I use King Arthur, purchased at Trader Joe’s)
- Cornmeal for pizza peel and dusting the top
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1. Mixing and storing the dough: Mix the yeast and salt with the water in a 5-quart bowl, or a lidded (not airtight) food container
2. Mix in the remaining dry ingredients without kneading, using a spoon, a 14-cup capacity food processor with dough attachment, or a heavy-duty stand mixer with dough hook. If you’re not using a machine, yo may need to use wet hands to incorporate the last bit of flour (I just use a sturdy wooden spoon).
3. Cover (not airtight), and allow to rest at room temperature until the dough rises and collapses, approximately 2 hours.
4. The dough can be used immediately after the initial rise, though it is easier to handle when cold. Refrigerate in a lidded (not airtight) container and use over the next 10 days.
5. On baking day, dust the surface of the refrigerated dough with flour and divide the dough into two pieces, one of which goes back in the fridge for later. Dust the piece with more flour and quickly shape it into a ball by stretching the surface of a the dough around to the bottom on al four sides, rotating the ball a quarter-turn as you go. Allow to rest and rise on a cornmeal-covered pizza peel for 40 minutes.
6. Twenty minutes before baking time, preheat a baking stone to 450F, with the stone placed on the middle rack. Place an empty broiler tray on any other shelf that won’t interfere with the rising bread.
7. Just before baking, sprinkle the loaf liberally with cornmeal and slash a cross, “scallop,” or tic-tac-toe pattern into the top, using a serrated bread knife. Leave the cornmeal in place for baking; tap some of it off before eating.
8. Slide the loaf directly onto the hot stone. Pour 1 cup hot tap water ito the broiler tray, and quickly close the oven door. Bake for about 30 minutes, until deeply browned and firm. Smaller or larger loaves will require adjustments in baking time. Allow to cool a bit before slicing.
Haven’t tried that one but the basic recipe is my go to for my daily bread. The proportions work great and I happily bought a pound package of instant yeast so it is easy to get it right.
I do mine in my Bosch compact mixer. I just put the water, part of the flour and the yeast in and mix it up and then let it sit for about 5 minutes. Then I put in more of the flour or other grain, the salt and mix that up until it is all put together. Then I add the rest of the grain until the dough is pulling from the side of the bowl. Then I just turn up the speed for about 3 minutes, put the dough in a 5 qt bowl and set it rest for 2 hours or so. At that time it is ready for whatever I want to do with it – refrigerate it, bake part of it and refrigerate the rest or just bake it all. Form the loaves, let them rest until ready to bake, and throw in the hot oven until done. I have baked in loaf pans, boule breads, Long skinny breads, individual rolls – it all works just fine. That book and my mixer and yeast are some of the best investments I have made in the kitchen along with a good knife. Highly recommended.
I’ve heard about that book but never seen in the bookstores. I love baking but baking artisan bread has been a BIG challenge for me. I’ve been trying it for years and still can’t quite make it the way I want.
Thanks for sharing the recipe, Eric! I would definitely give it a try.
Check Amazon or Barnes and Noble. They both carry it. So does Jessica’s Biscuit in New England.
Or click through from here and make Eric a couple of nickels!
It might even be a quarter!
But Rick: doesn’t turning up the speed for three minutes constitute kneading? This is supposed to be “no knead, no?
But it sounds like you’re getting excellent results, so you’re doing something right.
I am not a purist. I also sometimes add some sugar to the base mix which the recipe does not call for.
It just seems to work better when I do the 3 minutes speed up. If I don’t sometimes the load comes out misshapen. The speed up seems to prevent that. Of course the fact that I only have a “portable” countertop oven with the interior essentially 12x12x12 means that I don’t have the breathing room of a large oven to give me all the spring that I should get. That may mean I need the partial knead for it all to work right.
Does the concept of having pre-mixed, pre-risen dough apply to pizza dough? I’d love to be able to slice off some pizza dough for those late nights when I need to get dinner on the table in a hurry. If so, I’ll order the book and get you that quarter, Eric!
The book doesn’t say anything about pizza dough, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t work. After all, that’s exactly what the Trader Joe’s fresh dough is.
I’m willing to bet it’s even freezable; you could make a batch of, say, five, freeze five balls, and just take one out in the morning before you go to work.
I’ve had the TJ dough in the fridge up to about 10 days, and it’s always fine. That’s a superquick weeknight lazy-but-hungry dinner for us, too.
The pizza dough I make makes enough dough for two pizzas, so I’ve been freezing half of it for some years now. The thought that it might not have to be frozen, but just stuck in a bag in the fridge, is new to me, though. But yeah, it works.
Sounds like I need to lift my moratorium on new cookbooks and order this one–and “Happy in the Kitchen” as well. Two quarters coming your way!
There is a chapter in the book dedicated to flatbreads and pizzas. I haven’t tried them yet but have had great success with other recipes from that book.
Hi,Eric-san.
Hope you remember me.
Recently published Haruki Murakami’s book “IQ84 ” reminds me of you and days we read “TV people” in Japanese together.
So I googled your name and discovered you!
It’s a nice and big surprise to find how you have been.
I travel around this blog and enjoy yummy photos.
I will try some recipes.
Cornbread is my favorite!
For pizza I like Heidi’s variation of Peter Reinhart’s recipe on 101 cookbooks. I use half white half whole wheat flour, mix it in a stand mixer and form balls. Put those in individual qt size freezer bags and freeze right away. Take them out to thaw in the fridge the day I need them. TJ Dough is too gluteny to work with, even after sitting out for hours!
Masako! So great to see you here — we’ll take this to email!
And Stuart — haven’t tried Heidi’s pizza dough, but I will. Here it is:
http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/001199.html
I tried making the Broa. I like the simplicity of the recipe, but my bread came out with an inedibly hard crust and a dense, polenta-flavored, interior. Any tips on making this a ligther bread, or is that they way it’s supposed to be? I’m trying to move from relying on my bread maker, to baking by hand.
So sorry Shoshana! I think you mostly got it right; mine has a superhard exterior. It’s a feature not a bug! And yes, the interior is indeed very polenta-y tasting. My only suggestion would be to try a different polenta. LIke I said above, my is fancy-ish, and really tasty. But it’s also possible that you just might not like this style of bread. It’s really meant to be toasted afterward as well….
Thanks! I really like your blog.