Last week Tom was thoughtful enough to surprise me with a copy of My Bread: the Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method by Jim Lahey. Lahey, of course, is the baker who supplied Mark Bittman from the New York Times with the no-knead bread recipe he developed at Sullivan Street Bakery in New York. Bittman's article on Lahey's technique and the accompanying recipe published in the Times triggered widespread interest in no-knead breads.
When I flipped through the book and tried to decide which recipe I wanted to try first, I quickly decided on "Pane con Formaggio," or cheese bread. The reason for my selection was simple. I bought quite a bit of Asiago cheese last month with the intention of serving it at our holiday party. But with all of the other food we were serving, the cheese somehow fell through the cracks and it never even left the refrigerator. Lahey suggests using pecorino, Asiago, or aged Fontina for his cheese bread recipe, so it was the perfect excuse for using up some of our extra cheese.
The ingredients for this bread are bread flour, cheese, salt, yeast, black pepper, and water. There is quite a bit of cheese in the recipe: the cheese is cut into half-inch cubes and there is a 1:2 ratio by weight of cheese to flour. Cheese cubes were protruding and clearly visible on the top surface of the bread during the first and second rises. The recipe instructs you to bake the loaf in a dutch oven for 30 minutes with the lid on, and another 15-30 minutes with the lid off, until the bread is a deep chestnut color but not burnt. There is a picture in the book accompanying the recipe showing a loaf that is indeed deep chestnut, or what most of us might call burnt looking. I took mine out after a total of 45 minutes of baking, when it was still (relatively speaking) pretty light-colored. Even though Lahey does not provide a target temperature for the interior of the bread, I spot-checked it with an instant read thermometer. When I saw that it was at 217 degrees, I figured the bread should be done, even though it wasn't nearly as dark as the loaf in the cookbook picture.
At first, I was dismayed at how ugly this loaf was. It did not rise evenly and was fairly lopsided. Even more distracting were the crust's craggy texture and its mottled color scheme due to the cheese bits that had been on the surface during baking. It looked like a hot mess.
Tom and I waited for the loaf to fully cool, and I carefully sliced it open. The first thing I noticed was an amazing crackle to the crust as I sliced through it with a knife. The crumb looked good, and you could see little puddles of melted cheese inside. Tom tried a piece first. After he took a bite, all I heard was chewing, followed by lip-smacking and sounds of gustatory delight. I swear, it actually sounded a little like the "ohm nom nom" sound that Cookie Monster makes. I tried a piece and I understood what the fuss was all about -- this bread was freakin' delicious.
I happen to really love Asiago cheese, so I wasn't all that surprised to like bread with Asiago cheese baked inside. But this bread had just the perfect amount of cheese in every bite, which was wonderfully accented by the black pepper. The most amazing thing about it was definitely the crust. The crackly chewy crust with bits of browned and bubbled cheese was intensely flavorful and had an extraordinary texture. If you've ever had an Asiago cheese bagel with the browned cheese on top, it's somewhat like that, except a whole hell of a lot better.
One of my many silly habits is that whenever I talk about cheese, I often do a little imitation of Wallace from Wallace and Gromit. Wallace is an inventor who loves cheese above all else and who unabashedly declares, "I'm just crackers about cheese!" Well, Tom and I are just crackers about this cheesy bread (even though calling it "cheesy bread" makes it sound like something that should be delivered from Domino's). We ate the entire loaf in a day and could not stop talking about how tasty it was.
Recipe: Pane con Formaggio" from My Bread: the Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method by Jim Lahey.
Previous Posts:
When I flipped through the book and tried to decide which recipe I wanted to try first, I quickly decided on "Pane con Formaggio," or cheese bread. The reason for my selection was simple. I bought quite a bit of Asiago cheese last month with the intention of serving it at our holiday party. But with all of the other food we were serving, the cheese somehow fell through the cracks and it never even left the refrigerator. Lahey suggests using pecorino, Asiago, or aged Fontina for his cheese bread recipe, so it was the perfect excuse for using up some of our extra cheese.
The ingredients for this bread are bread flour, cheese, salt, yeast, black pepper, and water. There is quite a bit of cheese in the recipe: the cheese is cut into half-inch cubes and there is a 1:2 ratio by weight of cheese to flour. Cheese cubes were protruding and clearly visible on the top surface of the bread during the first and second rises. The recipe instructs you to bake the loaf in a dutch oven for 30 minutes with the lid on, and another 15-30 minutes with the lid off, until the bread is a deep chestnut color but not burnt. There is a picture in the book accompanying the recipe showing a loaf that is indeed deep chestnut, or what most of us might call burnt looking. I took mine out after a total of 45 minutes of baking, when it was still (relatively speaking) pretty light-colored. Even though Lahey does not provide a target temperature for the interior of the bread, I spot-checked it with an instant read thermometer. When I saw that it was at 217 degrees, I figured the bread should be done, even though it wasn't nearly as dark as the loaf in the cookbook picture.
At first, I was dismayed at how ugly this loaf was. It did not rise evenly and was fairly lopsided. Even more distracting were the crust's craggy texture and its mottled color scheme due to the cheese bits that had been on the surface during baking. It looked like a hot mess.Tom and I waited for the loaf to fully cool, and I carefully sliced it open. The first thing I noticed was an amazing crackle to the crust as I sliced through it with a knife. The crumb looked good, and you could see little puddles of melted cheese inside. Tom tried a piece first. After he took a bite, all I heard was chewing, followed by lip-smacking and sounds of gustatory delight. I swear, it actually sounded a little like the "ohm nom nom" sound that Cookie Monster makes. I tried a piece and I understood what the fuss was all about -- this bread was freakin' delicious.
I happen to really love Asiago cheese, so I wasn't all that surprised to like bread with Asiago cheese baked inside. But this bread had just the perfect amount of cheese in every bite, which was wonderfully accented by the black pepper. The most amazing thing about it was definitely the crust. The crackly chewy crust with bits of browned and bubbled cheese was intensely flavorful and had an extraordinary texture. If you've ever had an Asiago cheese bagel with the browned cheese on top, it's somewhat like that, except a whole hell of a lot better.One of my many silly habits is that whenever I talk about cheese, I often do a little imitation of Wallace from Wallace and Gromit. Wallace is an inventor who loves cheese above all else and who unabashedly declares, "I'm just crackers about cheese!" Well, Tom and I are just crackers about this cheesy bread (even though calling it "cheesy bread" makes it sound like something that should be delivered from Domino's). We ate the entire loaf in a day and could not stop talking about how tasty it was.
Recipe: Pane con Formaggio" from My Bread: the Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method by Jim Lahey.
Previous Posts:
- "The Best Use I've Ever Found For a Bottle of Beer: the Crusty Seeded Pale Ale Boule," January 10, 2010.
- "Bread in Five Minutes a Day?," January 9, 2010.
- "More Yeasted Breads: Whole Wheat Loaves," January 4, 2010.
- "2010: The Year of Yeasted Breads?," January 3, 2010.
Comments