Slow Food, Fast People

I’ve lived just outside the D.C. Metro area for my entire life but I can probably count on my two hands the number of times I’ve actually been to the city. Mostly they were for school field trips and a couple of concerts but the sad part is, I can’t even recall a time I visited for the mere sake of visiting. Yet, no matter how many times I intended to take a day trip to the big city during the past, oh… year, the thought of driving an hour (not including traffic) to get to a metro station, only to sit on the metro for another 30 minutes, is quite the deterrence. Yet, when temperatures spiked to 90 degrees and cherry blossoms were in full bloom almost two weeks ago, I could wait no longer.

I turned out to be a fulfilling and all-around fun day, a mini-field trip by myself. I got lunch at my beloved Pret (and refueled with yoga bunny detox after a 2-year lapse), visited my cousin at her work, sat in a park under a cherry tree, walked around like a dazed, camera-to-face tourist, and saw the American Food history exhibition/Julia Child’s kitchen at the American History Museum. Like I said, a pretty decent day. It did leave me exhausted though and I realized that D.C is a pretty exhausting place, much more so than other cities I’ve visited. People seemed to move about 10 times faster than normal and live their lives by means of a well-planned itinerary on their iPads and a cell phone that has taken up permanent residence at their ears. It was all a bit much. So naturally, in the spirit of a more relaxed, slow lifestyle, I bought a Dutch oven…naturally.

The renowned Le Creuset has been on my wishlist for quite some time but always frightened me away with a severe case of sticker shock. It suddenly hit me though that I should check them out at a factory outlet store and ended up walking away with a nearly half-price 5.5 quart with just a few paint imperfections. Fittingly, I broke it in with some classically slow sort of food. First I made a Dutch oven paella from Cook’s Illustrated, one of those stovetop, to oven, to table sort of dishes that Dutch ovens are perfect for. But, most importantly I made Jim Lahey’s no knead bread, the singular recipe that has been sitting in my queue, waiting for this one essential kitchen tool to come along. Kneadless to say (get it), it produced the most wonderful, rustic, and effortless loaf of bread to possibly exist.

I know that I am, per usual, the last to hop aboard fads, in this case the no-knead bread bandwagon. But I always say better late than never, eh? It’s simply amazing how you can mix together a few ingredients into the saddest, shaggiest mixture and 24 hours later it’s a bubbling brew of elastic, soft dough. Again, slow food for the win. Mostly I’m excited that I no longer have to solely rely on my standard bread baking method involving that dreaded moment of tossing the 5 lb loaf precisely onto the center of the preheated baking stone with a pizza peel. Now I just preheat the Dutch oven, plop the dough inside, put the lid on, put it back in the oven, and presto, out pops bread.

And not just any bread. Bread that sings a crackly little song when pull it out. Bread that stays so soft and tender on the inside but with a perfect toothsome crust that hurts your jaw a little but in a good way. Bread that makes breakfast such a dilemma because you cant decide weather to dress it up with peanut butter or jam or leave it in its full naked glory with just a hefty swipe of salty butter overtop. And maybe you should use it for the best darn turkey bacon and avocado sandwich for lunch too...just a thought. The only problem I seem to have with it is that it disappears maybe a little too fast. But no worries, just give me another day and there’ll be another ready, no rush.

No Knead (semi-whole wheat) Bread
Recipe by Jim Lahey

Ingredients
3¼ cups (300 grams) unbleached bread flour
¾ cup (100 grams) whole wheat flour
1¼ tsp (8 grams) salt
½ tsp (2 grams) instant yeast
1 1/3 cups (300 grams) room temperature water
additional flour or cornmeal, for dusting
flax and sesame seeds for the top, optional

Combine the flours, salt, and yeast in a bowl and stir until combined. Add the water and mix using your hands or a wooden spoon until everything comes together. You don’t need to knead it, just mix until there is no more loose flour and you have a shaggy, sticky mess. This is good. Cover the bowl and set aside for 18-24 hours.

After waiting, scrape the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and fold the dough under until you have a roundish shape. Take a clean cotton towel and place it inside a clean bowl. Dust the towel liberally with flour or cornmeal and shake and seeds you may want coating your bread into the towel. Place the bread seam side down in the bowl and cover with the loose ends of the towel. Let rise for 1-2 hours.

Meanwhile, when the dough has about 30 minutes to go, place your Dutch oven with the lid on in the lower-middle rack of the oven and preheat to 475 degrees. After 30 minutes, remove the Dutch oven and take off the lid. Lift up your towel with the dough inside, place your hand underneath, and quickly invert the dough into the center of the Dutch oven – it will now be seam side up. Cover the pot and place back in the oven for 30 minutes. Then remove the lid and bake for an additional 15 to 30 minutes until the bread is deep brown. Remove from the pot with the help of a wooden spoon. If the crust is crackling and the bottom sounds hollow when you thump it, it should be done. Place on a cooling rack and wait about 2 hours before cutting open…if you can.