Easy Gourmet Bread Recipe Ever

So, I am a baker.  I love to bake anything – cookies, pies, cakes and breads. Pretty much anything you can bake, I’ve done it. I know there are people out there who aren’t as gung-ho about baking as I am. I recently stumbled onto this super simple gourmet bread recipe on Pinterest and just had to try it. It is the easiest bread I have ever made. It tastes great and looks so amazing that others will think you’re a master bread maker when they see it. I tweaked the recipe a touch, but it is still super simple. I found out that this recipe is a spinoff of a “No-Knead” bread dough recipe printed in the New York Times a few years ago. The originator of the recipe is Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery.

So Simple Gourmet Bread

1 teaspoon active dry yeast

1 Tablespoon sugar

1 1/2 cup warm (not hot) water

3 cups flour

1 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt

Put water, sugar and yeast in a small bowl. Let the mixture sit until the yeast starts to bubble. In a separate bowl, mix flour and salt together. Once the yeast has bubbled, add the yeast mixture into the flour mixture, then stir until combined. Cover the bowl with Saran wrap and let it sit overnight. You can let the dough sit until the next morning and then bake it, or if you’re too busy, you can wait until the next night to bake it.

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Place the empty cast iron pot with the lid into the oven for 30 minutes. While the empty pot is in the oven, heavily flour a clean kitchen towel and pour the dough onto the towel. Lightly dust the dough with flour, and then place the Saran wrap back on the dough ball until the pot is heated. Then place the dough into the pot and bake for the remaining 30 minutes. Pull the pot out of the oven and marvel at your gourmet loaf of bread that only took five ingredients, no kneading and 30 minutes in the oven.

Joy Larson is a mother of four boys, graduate of The University of Montana, animal lover and writer.