Comments on: Major Failure

By: sabrebelle

sabrebelle — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 06:21:04 +0000

I’m late to this discussion, and I have never made No-Knead bread, but I make all of my own regular bread, and it’s almost always whole wheat. Two tricks to get a better rise: mix 2T of gluten flour into the whole wheat flour and add 1t. lecithin to the water, if you’re not opposed to soy. I find that it doesn’t work every time, but it helps.

By: Zia

Zia — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:00:40 +0000

When I bake bread I always use all whole wheat, and I’ve never had the too much salt problem (the last time I put to LITTLE salt, but that’s another problem…). That is weird, though. The one time I made no-knead bread I had the not rising problem.

Sorry I don’t have anything helpful. But I feel your bread pain.

Hugs and good luck!

By: cosetthetable

cosetthetable — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:11:14 +0000

I imagine that I would also love the results of the original recipe cooked in a covered round cast iron pan. Sadly, however, I’m not cooking in your kitchen recently, and my options are a loaf pan, a cookie sheet, 8×8 or 9×13.

I suppose there’s also the Bundt pan. That might be interesting.

In any case, : P.

I’ll email you back about the other thing as soon as I can without sounding like Jane Austen. (Just finished Mansfield Park again, so it is a serious risk.)

By: Karen

Karen — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 19:04:01 +0000

We’ve made a lot of no-knead bread at our house, but so far just with white flour. There have been many, many threads on the topic — some of which I have saved at home but not at work.

LONG rise is important, so you might have even gotten it too warm for a brief period of time. And I know that Bittman does his whole wheat in a loaf pan, but we really like the results from the original recipe cooked in a covered round cast iron pan.

I’ll link to more later when I am home.

By: cosetthetable

cosetthetable — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:44:40 +0000

Audrey- I was worried it was too cold, but I put it in the microwave with a mug of boiling water for a while, and that kept it warm enough (I think….)

Almostima- Thanks! I know I’ll get there eventually, I’m just not used to total and complete “just throw it away” kind of failure. Especially not on something that it renowned for it’s easiness. I also have no idea what went wrong!

By: almostima

almostima — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:28:13 +0000

Don’t be so hard on yourself. If I could do it, you can do it! I tried it here: http://almostima.wordpress.com/page/3/

By: Audrey

Audrey — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:38:17 +0000

My first attempt at No-Knead Bread was pretty much a failure. I had a hard time getting the dough to rise in my cold house. Using whole wheat dough probably adds another set of problems to troubleshoot, though.

I haven’t made the bread in a while — No-Knead definitely doesn’t have the same “bready” flavor as my favorite bread from Farm to Market (http://farmtomarketbread.com/) and I haven’t taken the time to research bread recipes that might turn out closer to what I like.