Artisan Bread in .......

Artisan bread in 5 minutes a day. No knead bread. So many shortcuts.

How long does it take to make a good loaf of bread? Even Luis seems to be under the misconception that it takes gobs and gobs of time every day. It really does not if one is willing to embrace modern technology. Yes, I resisted for years. No, I do not mean a bread machine. Bleh. Throw those things out. Inferior crusts, poor crumb. Used one for a while, and while it was better than store bought, the amount of real effort that good bread takes is so little that using a bread machine makes no sense.

I mean let technology handling the kneading for you. I mixed and kneaded by hand because that was the traditional thing to do. Then I got the Kitchen-aid mixer a number of years ago and tradition flew out the window when I saw how easy and effective that machine was at mixing bread dough.

Straight French baguettes? About 5 minutes of actually working with the dough.

Honey oat bread takes even less because I only have to shape one loaf, not three.

Sourdoughs are easy. They maybe take 10 minutes of actual work putting the ingredients in, maintaining the starter and shaping the loaves. The ten minutes is spread out over a couple of hours.

The Kitchen-aid handles the mixing, and I load the dishwasher, make lunch or do other housework while it kneads the dough. Rising happens without any effort on my part. Pop the dough into a lightly oiled container, cover and let it do its thing.

Bread is easy! Try it! It does not take a herculean effort to make breads. The hardest part is learning to shape, but boules are so easy and a great place to start. Skip the peel and shape onto a little parchment paper. You can slide that into the oven with the bread and not have to worry about deflating your loaf as you put it into the oven.

You can always expand into trickier breads if it appeals to you, but basic breads are just that. Basic. Anyone can do them. Try it. Do not let these shortcut bread books and bread article trick you into thinking that regular artisan breads are difficult. They are not.