Very Basic Bread

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I use this as the basis for my everyday bread.

One thing I have noticed is that Alton Brown always bakes HOT - meaning that his *finished internal temperature* is too hot, and therefore dry, for my tastes. This is true for his breads, cakes, cookies, muffins, quickbreads, you name it. Because he always lists the doneness temp, you can adjust as needed - Yey Alton - instead of the blind "bake for 45 minutes or until done" instructions.

I like it pulling this bread out at 185 F. It usually coasts up to 190 F with residual heat, then slowly recedes in temperature over the next couple of hours. As an experiment, leave the oven probe thermometer in the bread for the entire cooling cycle.

Alton always accounts for residual heat when cooking meat. I don't remember him mentioning it at all in baking.

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I love Alton, like most of us.. But every single one of his recipes always calls for way too long of cook times..

Whether its frying, or baking, it always seems long. I just made this recipe for the first time, I have a NORMAL, non convection oven.. Pre-heated to 400 degrees, within 15 minutes the crust already had a nice brown finish.. Nice to the point of it being done.

I rotated the pan at that time and let it go another 15 minutes (30 minutes in

At 30 minutes, I had enough, the bread was turning black.. I checked its temp and it was already at 210 degrees.

Its cooling now on the counter on a rack, but I must say, it looks BURNT! and its annoying, after spending so much time on something to have it look black.

This bread was in the over for less than HALF of what was called, I would love to send a picture to Alton and ask him "What is up dude?!" BTW, this is a brand new oven, not 3 months old.

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Years ago I had a fairly high-end bread maker and tried dozens of different recipes and box mixes. None of the scratch recipes ever came close to the best of the box mixes, but the good boxed mixes were nearly as expensive as a loaf of bakery bread.

This recipe with the flavor and texture developed by the pre-fermentation is better than any bread I've previously done, better than the bread my mother or grandmother used to make with much finer grain structure and more flavor.

I didn't use the mixer, but rather kneaded the bread by hand for about 10 minutes using a rams-head kneading pattern that I use for kneading ceramic clay.

Didn't have a terracotta dish, and wasn't excited enough to figure out how to get one home from a home store on my motorcycle, so i just threw a kiln shelf in the oven from my smaller kiln and it worked perfectly,

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I have prepared this recipe 5 times recently and I love the bread's flavor and its crust. It is so delicious! Also, it's a perfect size for our 2 person household. I prefer to omit the refrigeration step leaving the starter on the counter for 4-6 hours; then I proceed exactly as specified. For the final proof step, I place the dough on parchment paper which moves easily to the oven where I bake it on our pizza stone. It is usually done in 25 minutes. The instant read thermometer is very helpful, too. Tasty!

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Tasty but tough to handle.
I used bread flour, weighed ingredients, carefully followed each step, added extra flour to handle (about 1/3 c in all, kneaded appropriate times, allowed to rest appropriate times, and still I get a spreading blob at final step. The 'tighten up' never happens. I get a nice low profile free form loaf that tastes good. Oh, well. Pans for me and no nice crust.

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Thank you Alton! I am 61 and been baking bread for years. I have Williams Sonoma bread baking book but without your techniques i could never get a nice, crusty, brown, tall, loaf of bread. Even williams sonoma says splitting the top is decorative. As you showed me that is not the case. What is smooth and elastic? what does that look like? You showed me. The cornstarch wash makes a perfect crust. Thank you!

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the best bread I have ever made. Made some mistakes and did not have the terra cotta base (its winter and the local hardware is out dah but it still had an excellent chew. The youtube videos (pt 1-2 is invaluable in helping to explain the steps. Alton was/is always spot on with his cooking instructions

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Tastes good, but yes it's basic. This was my first bread and it was probably a good starter recipe, but I'll likely look for something more adventurous for next time.

I didn't have a pizza stone or ceramic pot base, so mine baked on the bottom of a large cast iron skillet turned upside down. I also don't have a pizza peel, so I did the final rise on parchment and slid it off a poly cutting board. Both of these substitutions worked out quite well.

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Tastes good, as far as basic bread goes. I agree with Alton on soaking the flour overnight as a preferment, to help hydrate the gluten, instead of using the straight dough method. But he is really over complicating a simple bread recipe.

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This recipe was simply fantastic. Google the video on youtube and watch it - definitely helps to see the technique and what the dough should look like at various stages.