No-Knead Bread: Great for Baguettes

Freshly Baked Baguettes

There are few recipes more minimalist than no-knead bread: flour, salt, yeast, and water mixed together, left to sit and ferment for half a day, then dumped into a lidded pot and baked for an hour. The original Jim Lahey recipe published in the New York Times back in 2006 has been tweaked and adapted by probably everyone who has ever tried it, including myself. I got so hooked on making it that I stopped bothering with making baguettes, and my long-sought Chicago Metallic baguette pan was looking quite forlorn.

So I got to thinking, is there a way to use the no-knead dough for baguettes? The heavy lidded dutch oven called for in Lahey’s recipe is intended to keep moisture in so the dough can bake in steam. This serves the same function as spraying water over the walls of a hot oven, only a lot easier. The first method that came to mind was to wrap the baguette pan with heavy aluminum foil. It worked pretty well, but after a while it can get expensive. Then I discovered that the pan would easily fit inside a large disposable foil buffet or food service pan, and could be sealed shut with the available lids. That worked exceptionally well, and now I make simple baguettes on a regular basis.

Please understand that this is a simple bread with none of the complexities sought out by true artisan bread afficionados. To make bread at that level requires much practice and dedication–it’s an avocation, if not a profession. For the purposes of a minimalist cook, we want simplicity and yet realness and goodness. This recipe turns out crusty, chewy baguettes that really complement fresh butter, dipping oils, soups, and sauces from stews. I love a hunk of it drizzled with honey for tea time. Anyway, here’s a step-by-step guide:

The Minimalist Cook’s No-Knead Baguettes
3 c unbleached flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp instant yeast
1 3/4 c water at 120F

Whisk together the dry ingredients in a medium-size bowl.
Add the 120F water.
Stir really well, until all the flour is moistened.
Scrape the dough off the spoon and the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula.
Cover the bowl and wrap in a towel, and let the dough sit at room temperature for at least 8 hours and up to 18 hours. When the dough is ready it looks all bubbly on the top.
Sprinkle some flour on the work surface, then scrape the dough out of the bowl onto the flour. The dough will be soft and wet, but don’t worry.
Roll the dough around a little to cover the surface with flour. Then with a knife or scraper, divide the dough in half.
Take each half and stretch it into a baguette shape–do this gently, coaxingly.
Then set them in the troughs of the baguette pan (my pan holds three loaves, but this recipe is best for two loaves).
Then set the baguette pan inside the foil buffet pan and pinch the lid shut.
Place the pan on the middle rack of a cold oven.
If you do not have a baguette pan or wish to have a larger loaf, do not divide the dough but shape it into a single oval loaf. Place it on a large sheet of aluminum foil, and bring up sides of the foil to form a sort of trough.
Pinch the foil across the top and up the sides. Leave enough room for expansion and the release of steam inside the foil (shown here before closing up the sides so you can see how much room to leave inside the foil).Turn the oven to 450F and let it bake for 45 minutes. Then remove the lid (or open up the foil)and let it bake for 15 minutes more, until the loaves are as browned as you like them. The larger single loaf:
And the baguettes: