Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day

 This book changed my life. I highly recommend you go out and get it, but for now, I will share on of my favorite recipes with you.

European Peasant Bread
3 cups lukewarm water
1 1/2 tablespoons granulated yeast
1 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt
1/2 cup rye flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
5 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

Mix all of the ingredients together. You will have a loose, sticky dough, which is exactly what you want. Cover the dough (not airtight), and let it rest at room temperature for two hours. This dough is easiest to handle after it has been refrigerated, so do that! Ready for the best part? It will keep in the refrigerator for up to 14 days! This recipe makes four loaves, so you just have dough in your refrigerator for two weeks, and take some dough out whenever you want a loaf a bread, or a pizza, or whatever. When you are ready to make some bread, the first thing you need to do it sprinkle some cornmeal on a pizza peel, and set it aside. Or, if you are like me, you use a thin flexible cutting board, because you do not have a pizza peel. Next, dust your work surface with some flour. Cut off a quarter of the dough, and plop it down on the flour. The dough is still going to be very sticky, so roll it lightly in the flour (without kneading), until you can shape it into a ball by stretching the surface of the dough around to the bottom on all sides. You want to do this fairly quick, so you do not handle the dough for too long. Place your lovely little ball of dough on that cornmeal covered surface you prepared, and let it rest for 40 minutes. 20 minutes into this resting period, crank your oven to 450 degrees, and have a pizza stone in there heating up. When you are ready to bake, dust your dough with flour, and slash a cross in the top of it. Pour some boiling water into an oven safe dish, and place it on the lowest shelf in your oven, and take out the pizza stone. Slide the loaf onto the hot stone, and put it in the oven! Bake for about 35 minutes, until the loaf is deeply browned and very firm. Now comes the hardest part..... let it cool completely before slicing (or tearing if you are me).
This might seem like a lot of instructions, but this is the easiest, best bread you will ever eat. I just typed all of this out, without reading the book. It is really simple once you get the hang of it, and I really recommend going out and getting this book. Oh and like I said, this recipe can be used for just about anything. I have made simple loafs, pita, pizza dough, flat bread..... the possibilities are endless.