The lovely addition of Tuscan flavor-infused broth elevates this traditional side dish. This delectable dish can be made in only 35 minutes and is really simple to prepare. This is an excellent side dish for your main course.
| Prep Time: | 20 mins |
| Cook Time: | 30 mins |
| Additional Time: | 20 hrs |
| Total Time: | 20 hrs 50 mins |
| Servings: | 12 |
| Yield: | 1 loaf |
Ingredients
- 3 ½ cups white bread flour
- ½ cup sprouted spelt flour
- ¼ teaspoon active dry yeast
- 2 cups cold water
- 1 ½ teaspoons fine kosher salt
Instructions
- Place bread flour, spelt flour, and yeast into a large mixing bowl and stir with a wooden spoon. Pour in cold water and mix until a very wet, sticky dough comes together, about 3 minutes. Add salt and mix for another 2 to 3 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl, cover with foil, and allow dough to rise at room temperature for 18 hours.
- Deflate bubbly dough with a spatula by scraping down the sides of the bowl and folding dough over itself, turning the bowl as you go around in a circular motion, about 12 times or so.
- Scrape dough out onto a heavily floured surface. Sprinkle the surface of dough generously with flour. Use floured hands to roll and fold dough on the table into a round or oval shape with a smooth surface, 1 to 2 minutes, adding more flour if dough is too sticky. The loaf shape doesn’t really matter, but a smooth surface is the goal.
- Transfer to a Silpat-lined baking sheet and let rise, uncovered, until doubled in size, about 2 hours. The dough will spread out more than rise up; this is normal.
- Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C). Place a rack in the center of the oven.
- Use a very sharp knife or razor to cut a shallow slash down the middle of dough, being careful not to deflate dough too much; the slash is optional. Spray the surface of loaf very lightly with water to help a crust form.
- Bake on the center rack in the preheated oven until nicely browned and loaf sounds hollow when tapped, about 30 minutes. Let cool on a wire rack before slicing.
- Regular all-purpose flour can be used for white bread flour; whole wheat flour can be used for sprouted spelt flour.
- You can use fine sea salt or another salt with no additives instead of kosher salt.
- If you don’t have a Silpat liner, you can generously sprinkle the baking pan with cornmeal.
Reviews
Delicious! I did not have spelt flour, I used all purpose. It is good any way it is used, sandwich, with soup, with butter or just plain.
Made this almost as specified. Just used less salt. This is an extraordinary recipe. The bread came out so wonderful, raised quite well with hardly any yeast. My go to from now on.
Very nice recipe, crispy outside, moist inside, great for toast and spreading butter, cream cheese or whatever else you like. I have done this many times and it’s my favorite bread recipe because it’s so easy and fault tolerant. You can let it rise even for 24 hours or more and it takes on a slightly sourdough odor which is not unpleasant. All purpose flour works fine. After much experimentation I found that 1/2 tsp yeast works well and produces a slightly lighter loaf. As others have mentioned the dough can be very sticky. This is how I handle it. I combine steps 3 and 4 and put the dough directly on a heavily floured silpat liner on my baking sheet. For the shaping: Make sure to flour your hands. A light touch helps here. With your fingertips flip and fold the dough over and over every which way until it becomes less sticky. To shape: tuck your fingertips under the outside edges and push lightly to shape it into a round loaf. Sprinkle some flour on top. As chef John said it’ll spread out a lot so a compact loaf is desirable. After the 2 hour second rise sprinkle some more flour on top. That makes it look rustic and helps the crust. In my powerful Bosch oven the bread is done in 25 minutes max. I check it at 23.
I have made it multiple times with just white flour and it always comes out great
I rarely write reviews for things, but I had to make an exception for this bread cause it’s just SO good. I’ve made it so many times. My family loves it and always asks me to make it for them… it’s a win every time! Thanks for making me feel like a pro baker, Chef John! 🙂
This bread is so effortless, it’s incredible how well it turns out. I’ve used the recipe to make loaves, stick bread, pull-apart, and buns, and it turns out perfectly every time. Our house is cold at night (13C/45F), but the dough still rises just fine overnight.
The family loved it! Made a couple grilled cheese sandwiches (so awesomely good) and garlic bread. And because I prefer hamburgers on toast, I’m going to try it in a loaf pan.
I’ve made this bread recipe several times now, and I love it. I sub half whole wheat flour (very finely ground) double the yeast and add just a little more water (because of the whole wheat flour) but otherwise I follow the recipe, and it turns out perfect every time. It is the first yeast bread I’ve been able to successfully make — my gateway to the bread-making world. Thank you Chef John!
Fantastic bread for grilled cheese, it gets really crispy.
It was so good! It was super easy to make, Chef John’s recipe was concise and easy to follow. I ended up using a tiny bit more water, but other than that, I followed the recipe to the tee. It has a mouth feel of English muffin crossed with French bread. Nice amount of pull, yet still supple. I made a sandwich out of it as well. Super sturdy and perfect for finger sandwiches. 10/10 would make again
Beautiful bread! It was easy to make , the smell and taste were wonderful! I chose to bake it in a Dutch oven on parchment paper.
This recipe was great! I will say, that my dough was a little too runny for me to be able to form it into a loaf, of any shape, so I had to add in another half cup of flour.
i did enjoy watching how chef john makes it, but i wanted to know what do i use in place of wheat flour never used it, wondering can i substitute it thanks chef john
I’ve never been good at breads or pastries but this came out pretty good. it makes a LOT of bread. I’m going to halve the recipe next time. I don’t have silicone sheet so I used 5 pieces of parchment paper
I have made this a couple of times. Turned out great each time and uses very little yeast. I think that it took me about 10 minutes of actual work with a lot of waiting (mix, 18 hour proof, fold, shape, 2 hour proof/rest, bake 20-30 minutes depending on shape). So good, cheap, and easy, but you have to plan ahead. This and an Irish soda bread are my go to recipes depending on how much time I have.
This is a good bread for when you want the bread to supply a supporting role, rather than being the star. Its relatively light texture makes it good for sandwiches. For those of you dealing with wet, soupy messes, if the dough looked okay after you mixed it, and it didn’t turn into soup until you looked at it the next day, it’s almost certainly the result of overproofing: the yeast has worked the dough to the point that the gluten is breaking down. The most common culprit for this is proofing either for too long or at too high a temperature. It can also happen if you add too much yeast, although you’d have to overdo the yeast by quite a lot to have much effect. A less obvious reason is if you tried to increase the proportion of whole wheat flour: doughs with a high proportion of whole wheat (or rye) will proof much more quickly than those without. In my own experience, you could probably increase the whole wheat to about one third of the total flour, but at the same time you’d have to reduce the proofing time by a third as well. In any case, don’t give up! Reduce the proofing time and/or temperature, and give it another shot. You won’t regret it.
Decent loaf. Easy to make, just like my favorite chef, Chef John, states. Taste was good for how it came out. The only thing I changed was where I proofed and baked. After the first rise, I followed the directions and then put it in an enamel dutch oven to proof and then baked it in there (also after the 2 hour second proof) for 20 minutes with the lid on, then 13 with the lid off. It rose well, and looked professional! When it cooled, it did get more fluffy which is nice, although I like a crunchy crust. It had a nice texture with decently sized holes inside. The flavor is the only reason I removed one star. But I understand this to be a country loaf, so I’m not sure if it’s worth taking the star away, but taste is a big factor. Don’t get me wrong, we loved it with our cheese and wine dinner! However I can taste a depth of flavor not quite developed in it despite a long proof time. Quite strange… I think I may try adding in some sourdough starter next time and balance the flour out with that to see if we can get the depth of flavor we are looking for.
Following the directions I wound up with a sticky mess. No amount of additional flour gives me a dough I can shape. What is a good room temperature for the dough to rise? For me it was about 65 degrees. Too cold?
Only bread I`ve ever baked before must have been back in the 90`s, like in the schoolkitchen. I followed the recipe after watching the always excellent Chef John video of it, ended up baking it in a preheated dutch oven. Heavenly crust and bread! My family thought so too, so now I`m making the fifth one in less than ten days. My toddler used to spit out bread and just eat the cold-cuts, bu this bread he eats happily. Thanks a bunch for this recipe!
Excellent. Made as written. Will make again!
I already wrote a review, but after reading about some of the trouble people were having I thought I might be able to help. I have had a really soupy dough after waiting 18+ hours and this is what has helped for me: use a little more flour on your surface than Chef John did, also, use a bench scraper or spatula. I learned this tip from watching another person make sticky bread. Using a bench scraper allows you to manipulate the dough without even touching it. You can lift up the dough with it and sprinkle some more flour underneath without making a horrible mess. I’ve probably added up to another cup of flour doing this, but I’m not doing any kneading. When I get to the point where I think I’m ready to transfer it on to the silicon, I put it in a 10 inch silicon cake pan. This way it doesn’t spread out so much. You actually end up getting a highter loaf. You are going to be able to see that it was done in a pan with sides, but it does brown nicely on the bottom and more importantly you get wonderful bread!