This is my son’s recipe for wonderful bread. He loves making it for his family, hope you enjoy it too.
Crusty Dutch Oven French Bread
2 ¼ teaspoons active dry yeast (1 package)
1 teaspoon sugar or honey
1 ¼ cup warm water (about 90 degrees)
1 Tablespoon salt
2 ½ to 3 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for shaping
Combine yeast, sugar, and warm water in a large mixing bowl. (I use my stand mixer with a dough hook.) Let sit about 5 minutes or until the mixture is foamy.
Add the salt and 2 ½ cups flour to the bowl. Mix with stand mixer until flour is incorporated and dough has started to pull away from the sides of the bowl. This is a pretty wet dough, but you may still need to add the additional ½ cup flour. Dust with flour and let rise for about 1 hour or until doubled in size.
Tip the dough out of the bowl and onto a floured counter. Sprinkle a bit of flour across the top of the dough, pull each corner of the dough in towards the center until the dough feels tight and begins to resist and pull back. You may need additional flour but try to no add too much. Form into a round loaf.
Line a bowl about the same size of your 10-inch Dutch oven with parchment paper coming up over the edges of the bowl. Sprinkle flour onto the bottom of the paper. Place some flour onto the seam side of the dough and place your loaf into the bowl seam-side down. Cover with a towel and let rise another 30 minutes while you preheat your oven AND the Dutch Oven.
Place your empty Dutch oven with the lid on top into your oven and heat to 450 degrees.
Remove the hot Dutch oven from oven and lift the loaf into the Dutch oven using the parchment as a sling. It is easier if two people each grab a corner of the paper. Put the lid back onto the Dutch Oven and carefully slide into the oven. It will be very hot.
Cook bread for 30 minutes. Remove the lid and continue cooking for another 10-12 minutes or until you have a beautiful brown crust. If you have a thermometer cook to an internal temperature of 210 degrees.
When done use oven mitts to pull the pot out of your oven. Use the parchment paper to lift the bread out of the Dutch oven and onto a cooling rack.
Let cool for at least 30 minutes or it will go doughy when you cut it.
Awesome bread to serve with spaghetti.
Dairy free as written.
Jan Dairy Keen
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