So I've been trying to bake bread but things are not working out for me. I have tried two no-knead bread recipes, the one from Lahey and the artisan bread in 5 minutes one.
The dough rises great and comes out with a great crust. There are a lot of air pockets in the crumb so thats all good.
However the crumb itself is like rubber and has little to no taste. I have tried many things like cooking it way longer, lower/higher temperature, longer/shorter with the lid on the pot. It always comes out the same.
What am I missing here, maybe I"m using bad flour?
>pic related
Its the one I just made but its the same dissapointing rubber crumb.
add a pan full of boiling water to the oven at the beginning
>one from Lahey
Well there's your fucking problem
>>7155706
I put the bread in a pot to contain the steam like a Dutch oven thing. I thought that was like the equivalent of putting water in the oven?
Also the picture you posted does not have my problem in it. Adding more salt to the bread is not helping at all in this case. Rubbery crumb isn't in there either, what am I looking at then? Too dense or poor texture? I have varied with salt, amount of water, amount of yeast, fermentation time and oven temperature already.
As far as I can tell those are pretty much the most important variables and it comes out exactly the same every single time.
I figure the whole no knead bread thing is a lie or this flour is not suitable.
>>7155734
Try cutting your loaf size in half and making 2, instead of 1.
Stick the other one in the freezer till you need it.
>>7155710
Kekd
start making sourdough bread. I ferment a 100% hydration dough overnight, then in the morning I dump it in the bread machine with some flour and salt to get the hydration down, let the machine knead it, then take it out, shape, rise, and bake in a regular oven.
>>7155923
Already did, this is a half one
>>7155947
I don't have a breadmachine. Might try sourdough but I'm pretty sure it would still be rubbery which is my main issue.
>>7155981
>The crumb never comes out as nicely as the crumb in a traditional kneaded loaf
I find a lot of pictures of great looking no-knead bread and my crumb looks great as well. It just feels like shit and tastes like nothing.
I've read somewhere that too much gluten can make the bread rubbery but was only 1 source which I can't even find anymore.
>>7156140
The usual reason for bread being too chewy or rubbery is too much gluten development. Usually this is due to overkneading, but if you're making no-knead bread this shouldn't be possible. Even if you're using high gluten flour it shouldn't become rubbery unless you knead it a lot.
It may well be the starch rather than the protein - you may have bad flour. When wheat is exposed to too much moisture before harvest, the wheatberries will start sprouting which degrades the quality of starch in them. This causes effects such as poor structure and a crumb that feels sort of gummy. You should try using another flour.
As for the taste, that's just sort of a given if you're using a yeast-leavened lean dough, i.e. your only ingredients are (white) flour, water, salt and yeast. You can get a little bit more flavor out of it by using a poolish (fermenting some of the flour overnight before adding the rest with more yeast) and/or by fermenting for a longer time at a lower temperature. Nothing beats a sourdough, though. Even then, white flour will never be hugely tasteful so you could add some whole grain flour or rye in your mix. I like to use sifted wheat flour, which is basically whole grain flour with some of the bran sifted out, a kind of a compromise between whole grain and white flour.
I had this problem w/no-knead bread...I realized I was under-cooking it and adding 10 minutes or so to the bake time improved the crumb significantly.
>>7155686
>no-knead
>no taste
NO SHIT. 3/10 BAIT MATE
