Bread, You Guys.

I've waited so long to share this with you. It's criminal, really. And it wasn't until Jolie posted this picture that I even remembered that I hadn't shared it. And then I felt totally guilty, like I was keeping it a secret, when all I want to do is share this with the world.

Because you guys. This bread. The ratio of easiness to awesomeness should not be legal. There is no kneading. And now I'm going to show you pictures and make you want to make it right now. Which, let's be honest, you probably should.

And now, I'm going to walk you through the process, step by step (day by day...).

Step 1: put 3 cups of flour, 1 3/4 tsp salt, and 1/2 tsp yeast in a bowl, and mix 'em all together. pro-tip: my measurements were not exactly exact, because I am lazy and didn't want to bust out my 1/4 tsp AND my 1/2 tsp. I just estimated my tsps using a 1 tsp measuring spoon. It was fine. I have no photo for Step 1, but since it just involves mixing dry ingredients together, you can use your imagination. It looks like a bowl of flour, basically. You can see it on this page if you want to, though, which is where I got the recipe. Her photos are better anyway.

Step 1.5: If you're feeling creative, add other (dry) stuff. I've done: fresh rosemary (kind of ripped apart with my hands) and chopped garlic (chunked, really; I just cut cloves roughly in quarters), and garlic powder with dried rosemary (not as good as the chopped garlic). I might try feta and garlic this weekend. Check out the original place where I got the recipe; she has a ton of combo ideas.

Step 2: Add 1.5 cups of water, and mix it all around. You'll have a ragged, clumpy ball that looks vaguely like dough. I used a spoonula for this, which worked very well.

RAGGEDY BALLS OF DOUGH
photo taken @ 8:20pm

For reference, the red bowl dough was made with brand new yeast. The silver bowl dough was made with slightly expired yeast. I wanted to see if it made a difference. I mixed the garlic and rosemary into the red bowl dough. End of note.

Step 3: Cover your bowls with plastic wrap. Let them sit out on your counter for 12-24 hours. I know that's a wide range. Really, it doesn't matter. If it's cold in your kitchen (or wherever you're leaving it to sit out, NOT THE FRIDGE), you'll want to leave it for longer since yeast likes warm temperatures for rising.

THEY HAVE RISEN! BUT NOT THAT MUCH!
photo taken @ 9:25am the next day
(aka, after 13 hours of rising)

Step 4: decide you want to see if they'll rise more, because it's cold in your kitchen, and maybe that yeast just needs to do it's thang for a bit longer.

MORE RISEYS!
photo taken @ 7:16pm that night
(aka, after just about 23 hours of rising)

Step 5: decide that 23 hours is enough time, and besides, they've risen a bit more (for reference, check the dough-lines on the silver bowl...you can kinda see the difference in how much it rose from 9:25am to 7:16pm. No? Just me? Fine.

Step 6: put some flour on your counter. Wish you had one of those fancy pastry cloths, because it's kind of hard to flour your counter very well, with no spaces showing (because this dough is crazy sticky and you don't want it to glue itself to your counter). Err on the side of too much flour, even though this will result in a very floury bottom of your bread. Oh well. Maybe use less next time?

Step 7: Heat your oven to 450, scrunch your dough into a round-ish shape, and cover it with a brand new sheet of plastic wrap the plastic wrap you used on the bowl earlier. Put your le creuset* in the oven and let it heat up for 30 min while your dough hangs out on the counter. *or other ovensafe pot with a lid. or cookie sheet with aluminum foil to cover the dough. anything ovensafe with a cover will work, according to the original recipe.

The silver bowl dough. It's not as risey as it could be.
Try to scrunch it into more of a ball-like shape, but end
up creating folds of dough with flour in-between, which
will end up sticking around after it's baked, which is not
the worst thing, but not the best thing either.

Step 8: take your pot out of the oven (IT IS HOT! REMEMBER THIS!), remove the lid, flour your hands and plop your ball o'sticky dough in your pot. Let your bread bakey bake bake for 30 minutes with the lid on, and then take the lid off (WEAR THOSE OVEN MITTS!) and bake for another 15 min to get the top all golden and crunchy.

OMG IT TOTALLY LOOKS LIKE BREAD!!!
Please be careful when you attempt to remove it from the pot.

Step 9: carefully remove your super hot bread from the pot and let it cool on a cooling rack or something. Do step 7-9 again with your second loaf of dough, because you're an overachiever like that. Be careful, because you're putting sticky dough into a super hot pot.

the red bowl dough rose significantly more, and I was better
at making it rounder. you can kinda see the chunks of garlic
and rosemary in it. delicious.

BA-BAM! IT'S MORE BREAD!

I'm not going to lie to you...this bread is freaking good. We finished two loaves in about 4 days. It's so super good, and tangy (even the plain version) without being too sour...just really, really good bread. And even though this how-to was kind of long and drawn out, it's incredibly easy. And fast. Throw the bread together in 5 minutes or less, let it sit for a day, and put it in the oven. Boom and done.

You're welcome.

Now go make bread and tell me about it.