Last weekend I attempted to make Mark Bittman's Speedy No-Knead Bread... sort of. Being the adventurous experimenter that I am, I altered the ingredients:
- 2 cups whole-grain flour + 1 cup all purpose flour
- 2 cups of really warm water (instead of the 1.5 cups)
I followed the rest of the recipe perfectly. However, the results were really unsatisfactory. The center was super dense and gooey, and the bread had a really really hard crust (ok, I also cooked it an extra 30 minutes because of the gooey center).
I didn't take any pictures, because the results were so embarrassing.
Here's what I learned: Bread Flour != All Purpose Flour (for the non-programmer, that means they are NOT the same thing!)
Fortunately, there are several articles online that expound on the differences between bread flour and all-purpose flour.
The secret is wheat gluten (or gluten additive). Essentially, you must add 1tsp to each cup of all-purpose flour to create bread flour. Unfortunately, this is not something I keep. So part 2 will have to wait until I go shopping...