The Ciabata Project

I LOVE BREAD

They used to say when I was a kid that if you went to prison you'd have to live on mere bread and water... Then send me off to prison because I LOVE bread!

I got a recipe for no-knead ciabata bread off the Inter-webs. It was easy enough. Mix 4 cups of bread flour with 1/4 tsp yeast, 1 tsp salt and 2 cups of warm water. Mix and let it stand covered for 18 hours! The dough is quite loose and wet.

Next day it's all frothy and bubbly and you punch it down (therapeutic!) and form it into a log shape on a greased and cornmeal dusted sheet. The dough is pretty hard to handle, so you have to flour your hands and the working surface liberally with flour.  Let it rise for another 2 hours covered with a floured tea towel.

This is it after the 2 hour rise.

Finally, you bake it at 425°F for 35 to 40 minutes until it sounds hollow when you tap on it with your fist.

You let it cool completely.

This is what it looks like when it's baked:

The outside is quite crispy and crunchy, and the inside is quite chewy. YUM! I served it with a home-made oven-roasted tomato and sweet onion sauce on penne with loads of fresh basil from my garden.

This is my herb garden where I got the basil: