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Is there anything better than the fresh smell of bread in your house? If you are like me, when I first started to cook, I was totally intimidated by bread. The yeast, letting it rise, getting the right consistency. I will tell you, we are both right to be scared. Bread is very temperamental. Well all you worries are solved with this Crusty Bread recipe. It has only 3 ingredients (plus water) and you just mix them together. There is a super big margin for error with this recipe.
Crusty Bread
My wife asked me to make her a bread. She just loves fresh bread. It made me realize, how long it has been since I made a fresh bread. This was the perfect recipe to get started with again. I made this recipe because I was making a pull apart bread. Have you seen those breads, where the top is cross hatched with slices about half way down, and then, the holes are stuffed with cheese? It is so good. This crusty bread works perfectly for the bread in pull apart bread. So there is no need to buy a bread at the store.
It is so cool to make recipes of the things we buy at stores. It shows you that it is not that hard. Best thing of all, it is so much cheaper to make it yourself rather than buying it in the store. You also know that it is fresh. The biggest problem, I had with my wife was getting her not to eat it. The bread after all was designed for the pull apart bread. She was not happy with me at first, but in the end, she was very pleased with the result.
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 3/4 tsp kosher salt
- 1 package of dry active yeast
- 1 1/2 cups of water (I used a little more to get the right consistency)
- Combine all ingredients in a stand mixer and mix well.
- You want the dough to pull away from the sides of the bowl and form a ball.
- Cover with plastic wrap and set aside in a dark, warm spot and let rise for at least 12 hours and up to 18 hours.
- After the dough has proofed, dust your counter with flour and knead the dough for a few minutes. It is very sticky and you can’t avoid it getting stuck on your hands. I added enough flour to get the dough to a very moderate tacky level.
- Turn your oven on to 450 degrees before you work your dough and to stick your Le Creuset in the heated oven for 30 minutes.
- After kneading your dough, put in your pot and cook for 30 minutes covered.
- For the last 15 minutes of cooking, remove the top.
- When finished cooking, let cool in the pot to get the crust good and hard.
Ingredients
The yeast combined with the all-purpose flour.
Yeast Added to Flour
Water is added and the dough is formed into a ball in your mix master.
Dough after Mixing
Dough after some additional kneading by hand.
Dough kneaded
The dough is placed in your Le Crueset (Dutch oven) and then put in the oven.
Dough Placed in Le Crueset
The final product.
Plated
Your bread just reached perfection! And it’s the Frenchy saying 🙂
You made me laugh Frenchy.
Nothing better to this Italian girl like a fresh baked loaf of bread. The beauty of rustic loaves is they don’t have to be all nice and neat! This is a wonderful bread.
I, too, like the look of rustic breads.
Homemade bread is the best, awesome recipe!
Thx Florian.
That is a fine a loaf of bread I’ve seen in any bakery. You did a great job.